1961: Cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin becomes the first human to enter space and the first to orbit the Earth, helping boost the Soviet space program and intensify the space race with the United States.

The diminutive Gagarin, who stood a mere 5-foot-2, appeared ready to pursue a career as an industrial worker but found his passion for flying while attending technical school. He entered military flight training and earned his pilot’s wings at the controls of a MiG-15.

Gagarin was selected as one of the Soviet Union's first class of 20 cosmonauts in 1960. He excelled in the training and so was chosen to be the first man to enter space – and perhaps partly because the Vostok-1 capsule was so cramped.

Space flight being very much a crapshoot at the time, Soviet authorities figured Gagarin was just as likely to die upon re-entering the atmosphere as he was to return safely. But return he did, and Premier Nikita Khrushchev – who hoped to use Gagarin’s success to strengthen the Soviet Union’s ballistic-missile program – rushed to his side to bask in a little reflected glory.

Twenty-three days later, on May 5, Alan Shepard became the first American to enter suborbital space, but it took nearly a year before a U.S. astronaut – John Glenn aboard Friendship 7 – successfully orbited the Earth.

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Space Shuttle Owners' Workshop ManualGagarin returned to flying jet aircraft and was killed in a training accident in 1968.

His pioneering 1961 spaceflight was nearly as close to the Wright brothers' first flight – just 58 years earlier – as it is to today.

Source: Wikipedia

Photo courtesy Russian Institute of Radionavigation and Time.

This article first appeared on Wired.com April 12, 2007.

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