Sputnik History

After the USSR launched Sputnik 1, man Americans were frightened by what they would do next. “...(the launch of Sputnik) showed clearly that the United States was no longer safe behind it’s ocean barriers.” (Document A) America had long relied on the oceans to keep European and Asian powers at bay, however, when the Soviets entered and took control of space, the US was surrounded and the Soviets could bomb them from any location. The US wanted to regain control of the situation so the Vanguard, a rocket with a more advanced satellite than anything seen before, was set to be launched on live television (Document F) The rocket fired but it fell back down, collapsed, and exploded for the world to watch. Americans were humiliated by this disaster, however they knew they must continue to fight communism, which meant beating them in the Space Race. During this time Americans became extremely anti-soviet and anti-communist, which continued long after this and still exists

The launch of the Sputnik had such a big impact on America because “America thought of themselves as the world’s technological leaders” (Richerme 35). Also “the Soviets, after all, were not supposed to be good at technology” (DeGroot 3). This scared America and brought them into a big crisis or as some call a race. This race was known as the space race and it was a very long and twisted path that it bared on its shoulders.

On October 4th, 1957, the Soviet Union launched Sputnik, a small satellite, successfully into orbit, and the Space Race truly

From this technological race came the “Space Race” that led to mankind’s first steps towards exploring the universe beyond Earth. The first move of the Space Race occurred when the Soviet Union launched Sputnik, the first satellite to successfully travel in space, on October 4, 1957. The satellite orbited the Earth for more than ninety days, and its sole capability was to emit a beeping noise only audible on certain radio frequencies (“National Debate Topic…”). The first U.S. satellite, named Explorer 1, was sent into orbit just three months later on January 31, 1958. From these technological advances developed new, more challenging goals such as sending a man into space, which called for the national funding of a program that could push the United States into the forefront of the fight. Thus, NASA was created by the National Aeronautics and Space Act of 1958, which President Eisenhower signed on July 29, 1958 (“Creation of NASA” 261). This moment did not officially begin the NASA however; the program truly began in 1915 with the creation of the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics (NACA). The stated goal of the Committee was to “…supervise and direct the

Russia launched Sputnik, a satellite to orbit the earth, into outer space on October 4th, 1957. With tensions already running high in the Cold War, Americans panicked at the thought of the Russians building space and nuclear energy, fearing it could be used on them. The conflict now called the Space Race resulted in Americans creating NASA and pushing the sciences in school.

This picture depicts a Soviet scientist putting the finishing touches on Sputnik, a satellite that would soon be launched into orbit around earth. The news of the launch came as a big, unpleasant surprise to the US (The Start of the Space Race). They feared the military capabilities of satellites in orbit as well as the advancement of Soviet technology. The US immediately reacted by launching Vanguard into orbit, but it failed miserably when it was launched (Space Race.). Although the US managed to successfully put Vanguard 1 into orbit later that year,

The Soviets wanted to study the earth’s atmosphere, the behavior of animals in space, and the testing of rocket technology. Russia launched Sputnik 1, which carried a dog, into space. This helped to understand how humans might react in space and through the reentry process. The United States was urged to invest more of their money and resources into its space program, generating a race between the two countries to land a person on the moon. The whole race started on October 4, 1957, when the first Sputnik was launched. This satellite weighed about 184 pounds and the official name of it was "Iskustvennyi Sputnik Zemli" (1). Which meant "fellow world traveler of the earth". To counteract the United States’ launch of the Explorer 1, a satellite that included a rocket motor, the Russian’s responded with Sputnik 3 on May 15, 1958. The first three Sputnik satellites all carried instruments to measure the temperature and density of the earth’s upper atmosphere. Solar energy was used for the first time by Sputnik 3 to power its instruments and transmitters.

In September of 1957, the Soviet Union began testing intercontinental ballistic missiles, or ICBM’s, due to the Cold War and to show their technological advances leasing to the Space Race. The United States knew that the Soviets had the capability of building these missiles, but didn’t think they actually could (Barbree). Then on October 4, 1957, the Soviet Union launched the first man-made satellite known by the name of Sputnik, and sent the United States into a frenzy. Sputnik impacted the United States socially, politically, and economically.

During the Cold War, the rivals--the United States and the Soviet Union--were in what seemed like a competition to determine who had the most advanced technology. This was because that country will be seen as the strongest and the biggest threat to the other. The space race really began officially on October 4, 1957, when the Soviet Union launched Sputnik I, which was the first artificial satellite ever to be launched in space. This was seen as a danger to the United States, because it meant that the Soviet Union was possible capable of doing other things, possibly against the US. Then the Soviets launched Sputnik II, but this time it had a passenger, a dog named Laika. Though this mission was a failure because poor Laika died within hours

By examining the two nations’ early space technology, it is evident that Russia was initially superior in this regard. Launching the world’s first-ever artificial satellite — called Sputnik I — in October of 1957, the USSR chalked

The next American thing to go up into space was the Explorer 1, a satellite used to measure the radiation in Earth's orbit. The Explorer 1 was formally known as Satellite 1958 Alpha. The program at the California Institute of Technology that was to make the Explorer 1 had taken only three months to build the satellite. The Explorer 1 was launched in January 31, 1958 from Cape Canaveral and was America's first satellite. It was sent up into space with the use of a Jupiter-C vehicle, which is "a special modification of the Redstone ballistic missile" (Explorer-I and Jupiter-C). The Jupiter-C vehicle was, under the management of Dr. Wernher Von Braun, a German scientist. Dr. Wernher Von Braun was part of the Army Ballistic Missile Agency, also known as ABMA. Once the satellite was up in orbit, it started its tests on how much radiation was in Earth's orbit. The scientist who was in charge of this experiment was Dr. James Van Allen. The Explorer had found that the level radiation was very low which went against Dr. Van Allen's prediction. Dr. Van Allen then made another prediction that the equipment that was used on the satellite was corrupted by a powerful belt of radiation. A couple months later when the second satellite went up

To begin with, the Space Race began all because of the Soviet Union and they kept pushing on to create and carry out with their objectives, meanwhile the United States was doing nothing. In an article, “United States-Soviet Cooperation during the Cold War” nasa.gov. Erika Vick, May 28, 2008. Web. , it says, “History changed on October 4, 1957, when the Soviet Union successfully launched Sputnik I.” In the late 1950’s they launched Sputnik I, which created the Space Race and it continued into the 1960’s, where the Soviet Union and the United States tried beating each other. If the Soviet Union started it, they should earn a little credit for giving the space science a tremendous advancement. For example, in an article by Global Security website, it says, “When communists were pressing for joint action in 1963, what it had meant was Soviet commitment to the policy of

On October 4th, 1957 the Soviet Union launched the first ever satellite, Sputnik. The launch of Sputnik sent the United States into a frenzy, beginning the Space Race, and the innovation of technology as a whole. The Space Race most importantly had a major impact on the evolution of the United States’s defense technologies through the launch of Sputnik. The Space Race sparked the United States battle for technological superiority against the USSR, and lead to improvizations in their satellite and satellite defense technologies.

The origins of the Space Race can be found in Germany in the 1930s. During World War II, Nazi Germany was researching and building operational ballistic missiles and experimenting with liquid-fueled rockets. As early as 1942 and 1943, the rocket Aggregate-4 became the first vehicle

The space race did not start as one would expect with the respective American and Soviet space agencies. But rather it began with the German V2 missile launches towards the end of World War 2. The V2 missile