This week in 1968, workers at the Mississippi Test Facility – today’s NASA Stennis Space Center – conducted cryogenic testing of the Saturn V second stage, S-II-4 to certify the integrity of the S-II stage’s LH2 liquid hydrogen tank. This was the first cryogenic proof test of the S-II program. All S-II stages scheduled for use on crewed launch vehicles would undergo the cryogenic proof test at the test facility to further certify the structural capability of the stage. The S-II-4 was employed on the Apollo 9 mission. Here, the S-II all systems stage is seen in the test stand. The Saturn V was designed at NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center. From October 2018 through December 2022, NASA will mark the 50th anniversary of the Apollo Program that landed a dozen astronauts on the Moon between July 1969 and December 1972, and the first U.S. crewed mission – Apollo 8 – that circumnavigated the Moon in December 1968. The NASA History Program is responsible for generating, disseminating, and preserving NASA’s remarkable history and providing a comprehensive understanding of the institutional, cultural, social, political, economic, technological and scientific aspects of NASA’s activities in aeronautics and space. For more pictures like this one and to connect to NASA’s history, visit the Marshall History Program’s webpage. (NASA)