[Stoat]

Jay Walker poses with his Sputnik satellite in his Ridgefield, Conn., home Friday, Sept. 28, 2007. The satellite, which Walker says is neither a model nor a replica, is one of the Sputnik satellites built by the Soviets in 1957. He says he acquired the satellite through a listing on eBay. (AP Photo/Bob Child)

Jay Walker poses with his Sputnik satellite in his Ridgefield, Conn., home Friday, Sept. 28, 2007. Walker says that he acquired the spacecraft, which he says is one of the original Sputniks built by the Soviets in 1957 and is neither a model nor a replica, through a listing placed on eBay by a pilot who frequently flew the Moscow route. Walker is the executive producer of the documentary film 'Sputnik Mania' that is being brought out in connection with the 50th anniversary of the launch of the original Sputnik on Oct. 4, 1957. Walker is the founder of Priceline.com. (AP Photo/Bob Child)

Graphic and illustration on Sputnik 1, the world's first satellite that was launched by Russia on October 4, 1957.(AFP Illustration)

Sputnik 1 -- the world's first artificial satellite -- was launched in 1957 from the Baikonur cosmodrome in Kazakhstan.(AFP/TASS)

[Tennessee Nana]

Yuri Gagarin, the russian astronaut, was a hero

[shield]

bfl

[LZ_Bayonet]

Sounds like they “awakened a sleeping giant” into a development surge that they couldn’t match, especially from a cost perspective.

[MaxMax]

But 50 years later, it emerges that the momentous launch was far
from being part of a well-planned strategy to demonstrate communist superiority over the West.

Thats ok, look where it made America go. America always needs a challenge to go beyond imagination.

[dragnet2]

Great article, thanks for sharing.

[Ruy Dias de Bivar]

I remember all of our family standing out in the yard watching that little spot of light move across the heavens.

So it was only a second stage booster it was still facinating!

[grey_whiskers]

Two points stand out:

1) The Communists lied and exaggerated, aided by the mainstream press.

2) Notice the Kruschev's son is in a position at an Ivy League school?

Cheers!

[Richard from IL]

The oldest man made satellite in orbit, Vanguard 1, was designed by my father.
http://www.lindahall.org/events_exhib/sputnik/sputnik_roger.shtml

[RayChuang88]

What's amazing is that the R-7 launcher rocket that was designed in the 1950's is still operational today in an updated form as a satellite launcher! The Russians still use it to launch the current generation Soyuz TMA spacecraft that regularly visits the International Space Station. And this launcher rocket will soon operate from ESA's launch site Kourou in French Guiana.

[SuziQ]

Space ping!

[JSteff]

“It was called PS-1, for “Prosteishiy Sputnik” — the Simplest Satellite.”

Good move guys. Looking back through time now the Russians probably wish they had shot the developers on the spot and sent their corpse's to Siberia.

And so the Russians learned that if you wake up the sleeping giant it will bankrupt you and cause your form of government to end.

[tlb]

“Surprise!’ The first cut from Leslie Fish’s album “Minus Ten and Counting”:

Remember the fifties, those fat complacent days
When the future seemed a century away?
Then up went Sputnik, gave the world a butt-kick,
And made it clear tomorrow starts today.

Beep beep, boop boop,
hello there! (Gazhupa!)
Sputnik sails giggling through the sky.
(hey! hey! hey!)
Red flags, red faces, jump in the race as
The space age begins with a surprise.
(surprise!)

You generals once thought Von Braun a waste of cash
And that Goddard needed treatment really bad.
Then that global shot put gave you the hot foot
and beep beep, you’re blasted off the pad.

(Chorus)

Done for a threat, propaganda, or prestige,
The point is, the thing was in the sky.
It made generals frown and put money down
And meet that bet or know the reason why.

(Chorus)

That’s how it started, all those years ago,
The push that got us climbing into space.
Cynic beginnings bring forth big winnings,
But look at all we’ve gotten from that race.

(Chorus)

(musical interlude)

Old sputnik wore out and spiraled back to earth
On re-entry it burned up very soon
Hail and goodbye to that upstart of the sky
And in twelve more years a man walked on the moon.

Beep beep, boop boop,
hello there! (Gazhupa!)
Sputnik sails giggling through the sky.
(hey! hey! hey!)
Red flags, red faces, jump in the race as
The space age begins with a surprise.
(surprise!)
And the space age begins with a surprise

[Captain Beyond]

bump

[Just mythoughts]

placemarker

[BluH2o]

And that winking light that crowds around the globe gathered to watch in the night sky? Not Sputnik at all, as it turns out, but just the second stage of its booster rocket ...

I was a young teenager when Sputnik was launched by the Russians on October 4, 1957. Hunting with a friend the weekend after the launch we both observed Sputnik orbiting the earth far overhead. It was about 3 or 4PM on a perfectly clear mild fall day in eastern Canada. The late afternoon sun, setting in the west but still well above the horizon, illuminated Sputnik which was orbiting high in the eastern sky, traveling from the SSE to NNW. Sputnik, to the naked eye, resembled a small silver ball bearing ... at least from our vantage point. When my friend and I arrived home later and told others of what we saw ... it was met with skepticism. Later that evening my mother was listening to the news on the radio; a captain of a ship on the St. Lawrence River (approx. 100 miles to our north) had reported sighting Sputnik about the same time we saw it. This convinced skeptics that my friend and I had in fact seen Sputnik ... not an aircraft, or, just making up some fanciful story. Years later, at the Smithsonian Air & Space museum in Washington, I saw a depiction of the Sputnik orbit ... and indeed it did track over eastern Canada.