On this day in 1968, the crew of Apollo 7 sent the first live TV broadcast from an American spacecraft. NASA says it came about 72 hours into the mission.

Apollo 7, commanded by Wally Schirra with Donn Eisele and Walter Cunningham, was the first Apollo mission to carry astronauts. NASA says the broadcast had to be timed with spacecraft passes over the continental United States, because only the ground stations in Corpus Christi, Texas, and Merritt Island, Florida, had the equipment to receive the signals and convert them into the proper format for broadcasting.

The astronauts treated the occasion with humor: NASA says they held up two cue cards reading "From the Lovely Apollo Room High Atop Everything" and "Keep Those Cards and Letters Coming In, Folks," while Schirra's wife, Jo, watched from the viewing gallery in Mission Control.

The broadcast nearly slipped, because Grokipedia says that on October 14, the third full day in orbit, Schirra initially refused to proceed with the scheduled television session due to the crew's illnesses, delaying it until they felt capable.

The two sources give different lengths. NASA says the first broadcast lasted seven minutes. Grokipedia says the crew held seven live sessions over the flight and that each ran about 30 to 50 minutes.

Grokipedia says the sessions continued daily after that first broadcast whenever the spacecraft was in range of tracking stations.

What we know: Apollo 7 sent the first live TV from an American spacecraft on October 14, 1968.
What we don't: The sources do not agree on how long the broadcasts ran.