The Race For Space

Author: Cher Gruener 

For more than a decade the United States and the Soviet Union were engaged in a heated race to see which country could win. It was agreed amongst the two countries that space exploration was important, but the space race begun in earnest in 1957 when the Soviet Union launched the Sputnik, the first artificial satellite.  From there, both countries were anxious to be the first to be able to show their scientific know how as well as their military might. The two countries were in a hurry to be able to launch men into space and perhaps even land on the moon.  

The Soviet Union was eager to show the United States that their way of Communism was much superior to the methods of the US.  The Soviet Union was able to do this by launching Sputnik (meaning traveler in Russian) into space in October of 1957, followed by the US a year later. On this mission into space, was a dog. The dog was launched to see the effects on space in order to see the effects of space and atmosphere on humans as well as the animal kingdom.  However, the first dog sent into space did not fair as well as they would have liked. In 1960, the Russians however, successfully sent two dogs into orbit and were successful in returning them to earth alive. 

With the Soviet Union using dogs, the United States used chimpanzees for their space exploration endeavors. When it was deemed safe for human kind and both countries felt that they had both the knowledge and the expertise to sustain life in space and also the ability to bring them home safely, the two competing nations successfully. The Russians first proved they were up to feat by launching the first human into space in 1961. Russian Yuri Gagarin was the first successful human that was launched into space followed shortly by the United States, who successfully managed to launch Alan Shepard Jr. into space. 

From there, even though there was success in the race to conquer space for the United States by being the first nation to actually land on the moon, the journey was not without its hazards and even disasters. But with the persistence which the United States used in it’s space exploration, certainly paid off.