The Explorers' Club, № MXCIX

Operation AXIOM: The Space Age—The 50th Anniversary of Apollo-Soyuz, Part I
15-16 July 1975: Soyuz 19 lifted off from the Kazakh S.S.R.'s Baikonur, with CDR Alexei Leonov & F.E. Valery Kubasov aboard a Soyuz 7K-TM capsule atop a Soyuz rocket; call sign Soyuz ("Union"); CDR Tom Stafford, C.M.P. Vance Brand, & Docking Module Pilot Donald "Deke" Slayton lifted off from Florida's Kennedy Space Center aboard an unnamed Apollo C.S.M. atop a Saturn IB rocket.

Commentary: Apollo-Soyuz was the final flight of an Apollo Command & Service Module & the last American manned space flight until the Space Shuttle began flying in 1981. So, we here at "The Explorers' Club" are pulling out all the stops & giving the A.S.T.P. the full Apollo mission treatment. The three manned Skylab missions were arguably more interesting & important that the A.S.T.P., but they were just too long for this kind of effort.

Bonus! Space Age Song o' the Day: The Apollo-Soyuz Test Project
Less Than Jake, "All My Best Friends Are Metalheads" from Hello Rockview (Space Cadet Mike Papa DSKY)

Commentary: The above image is the American version of the Apollo-Soyuz Test Project mission patch. The Soviet version was identical, just rotated one hundred eighty degrees (180º) so that the red was on the left & the blue on the right. (The different patch orientations can be seen in the crew portrait above.) The Soviet name for the mission was Experimental Flight Soyuz-Apollo.

Semper exploro.