Soviet Union is the country that placed the First space station into the orbit around the earth followed by a team sent from earth to link up with the station that was developed. It is still an important part of history as far as space travel for humans are concerned. A space station is actually a spacecraft that can support human survival for a long time and other spacecrafts can dock with it. It cannot travel to earth and back by itself, so it requires other spacecrafts to bring in supplies.