ARIES (Authentic Representation of an Independent Earth Satellite)

From The Space Library

The space laboratory, designed by the Martin Company, called ARIES, for Authentic Representation of an Independent Earth Satellite had four compartments, contained a complete space kitchen, sleeping and sanitation facilities, and a comprehensive library. It was installed as an exhibit at the American Museum of Natural History in New York City and unveiled on October 12th 1961. The Martin company donated $100,000 to the museum for the exhibit.

The structure was built by the Martin Marietta Corporation and was 41 feet long, 15 feet high and weighed 5 1/2 tons and was an aluminium cylinder as big as a four room house. It was the central feature of the museum's Man in Space exhibit. It featured the prototype of the Whirlpool Space Kitchen which subsequently toured America. The kitchen was equipped with an oven, refrigerator, freezer, and food dispensers. The dispensers were attached to feeding tubes and a tray. The astronaut locked his tray in the counter top and was seated in a moulded chair with a lockbar across his knees to keep him in place. The kitchen could be stocked with 108 cans of frozen foods, like pineapple, apple, strawberries, fruit bars and pound cake. 207 canned main items like veal steak, ham and eggs, vegetables and potatoes; 618 plastic tubes of dried milk, cocoa, tea, coffee, fruit juices, eggs and steamed rice. The kitchen took up ten feet of one side of the ARIES laboratory. 3.5 gallons of water were available per crew member. Howard Brehem of Whirlpool was project coordinator for Whirlpool.

The astronauts had a laboratory for conducting experiments on animals and a library with more than four million pages of reading material from comics to classics, compressed into a 90 pound microfilm unit.

The ARIES space laboratory was loosely based on the Manned Orbiting Laboratory framework which was being built by the USAF for orbital surveillance in the early 1960s. The Whirlpool kitchen was later adapted for use in the motion picture 2001 A Space Odyssey.

The space kitchen was originally delivered to the USAF for training purposes in May 1961. By June a version of it was on display in Washington DC.

By April of 1962 the Whirlpool kitchen was touring the United States and was an attraction in department stores. In 1971 Whirlpool adapted the kitchen to be used aboard the Skylab space station.

Astronaut prepares a meal inside the Martin-Marietta ARIES mockup space laboratory.	Eating a reconstituted meal inside the Martin-Marietta ARIES mockup space laboratory.	The Martin-Marietta ARIES mockup space laboratory on display at the American Natural history Museum in late 1961.	A view inside the Martin-Marietta ARIES mockup space laboratory.
The Martin-Marietta ARIES mockup space laboratory with the Whirlpool space kitchen on the right.	The Martin-Marietta ARIES mockup space laboratory command and observation station.	Artist's rendering of the Whirlpool space kitchen circa 1971 as adapted for Skylab.	The Whirlpool space kitchen installed inside the Martin-Marietta ARIES mockup space laboratory.
Actor Dewey Knipp and General Holger Toftoy inside the Whirlpool space kitchen in St Petersburg Florida (1961)