Future Cities by Robert McCall

The author of the emblem is the outstanding artist Robert McCall. As the basis for the drawing, the artist used his own painting “Meeting in Space,” dedicated to the docking of the Soyuz with Apollo and painted even before the docking actually took place. On the border of the patch are the names of American astronauts and Soviet cosmonauts (in Latin and Cyrillic letters, respectively). Crew members are also identified by 3 white stars on a blue background (American crew), and 2 gold stars on a red background (Soviet crew). Initially, in the center of the emblem there was a stylized image of the flags of the USSR and the USA, but it was rejected by the NASA administration as “overly politicized.”