Colonel Pogue, who died on March 3 at 84 at his home in Cocoa Beach, Fla., was a member of the three-man crew that flew the longest, and the last, manned mission aboard Skylab, from Nov. 16, 1973, to Feb. 8, 1974. “I try to put myself into the human situation, instead of trying to operate like a machine.” 
 
 In his 2011 autobiography, “But for the Grace of God,” Colonel Pogue said the tensions between the astronauts and their ground controllers came to a boil about six weeks into the mission. The work could be tiresome and tedious, though the view was spectacular.” 
 
 He was known for his candor — a Baptist-educated fighter pilot who seemed willing to jettison the heroic image long attached to the first generation of Americans in space in favor of a more regular-guy model. "We didn't find out until about halfway through [our stay] that we had been overscheduled. He and the others just wanted more time to look out the window and think. The flight had made him “much more inclined toward humanistic feeling toward other people, other crewmen,” he told Science News in 1985. It led to a compromise with controllers, which made the mood during the last six weeks of the flight much more pleasant, he wrote, for “studying the Sun, the Earth below, and ourselves.” 
 
 William Reid Pogue was born in Okemah, Okla., on Jan. 23, 1930, to Alex and Margaret McDow Pogue. He then served two years as a member of the U.S. Air Force's precision flying team, the Thunderbirds. The mission held the record for the longest spaceflight until 1978, when Soviet cosmonauts spent 140 days on the space station Salyut 6. Afterward he earned a master’s degree in math at Oklahoma State University, taught math at the Air Force Academy and graduated from the Air Force test pilot school at Edwards Air Force Base in California. Prior to his Skylab stay, Pogue also served on the support crews for the first manned flight for the Apollo command module, Apollo 7 in 1968, as well as for the first and third successful lunar landing missions, Apollo 11 in 1969 and Apollo 14 in 1971. In addition to consulting for the Department of Energy and the Public Service Company of Oklahoma, Pogue served as an adjunct professor at the University of Arkansas and conducted technical work for Martin Marietta Corp. (now Lockheed Martin) in support of the space systems division of Air Force Systems Command. Pogue was awarded NASA and Air Force service medals, among other honors. Colonel Pogue, whose death was confirmed by NASA, is survived by his third wife, Tina; three children from his first marriage, to Helen Dittmar Pogue; and four stepchildren from his second marriage, to Jean Ann Baird.
– Astronaut Bill Pogue has died at age 84, and Space.com notes that he earned his spot in history by serving for nearly 3 months aboard the Skylab space station in the early 1970s. That stint aboard the earth-orbiting outpost earned him and his two crewmates the distinction of the longest human spaceflight up to that point. But the New York Times notes that Pogue and friends earned another distinction as well—they became the first astronauts to stage what amounted to a strike while in space. About halfway through the mission, the crew got fed up with the constant, mundane chores that ground control had them doing, and staged their job action. While NASA officials at Cape Canaveral chalked it up to possible depression, Pogue explained later that he and his crewmates simply wanted more time to enjoy the view and reflect, reports the Times. The two sides reached a compromise, making the last half of the mission more suitable for “studying the Sun, the Earth below, and ourselves," Pogue wrote in his autobiography.