A little wonder, every day

Korolev and the team behind the first human spaceflight

Мальований портрет Сергія Корольова; не фотографія / Drawn portrait of Sergei Korolev; not a photograph. Attribution and rights as recorded by the source.

Історичне фото Юрія Гагаріна й Сергія Корольова; космонавт і головний конструктор / Historical photograph of Yuri Gagarin and Sergei Korolev; the cosmonaut and the chief designer. Credit: mos.ru; CC BY 4.0. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0 Source: https://commons.wikimedia.org/?curid=154814330

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Мальований портрет Сергія Корольова; не фотографія / Drawn portrait of Sergei Korolev; not a photograph. Attribution and rights as recorded by the source.

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On 12 April 1961 Yuri Gagarin made the first human spaceflight aboard Vostok 1. Sergei Korolev was the chief designer who led development and launch work for the program; it was the achievement of large teams, rather than a single-person invention. Korolev was born in Zhytomyr on 12 January 1907 in the Gregorian calendar. His engineering and organizational role must be distinguished from the cosmonaut’s role: Gagarin was the person who flew into orbit that day.