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Optical telescopes
Galileo built his first telescope in 1608 and subsequently made many improvements to telescope design. -
Newton
Around 1670, Sir Isaac Newton built a different kind of telescope. Newton used curved mirrors to focus light and so created the first reflecting telescopes. -
Robert H. Goddard
1926-Robert H. Goddard launches first liquid fueled rockets -
Soviet Union
1933-Soviet Union launches first rocket of there own -
V-2 space rocket
1946-First research flight launched by the U.S. captured by the V-2 space rocket -
Fruit flies
1947-First animals launched into space (fruit flies) by the U.S. -
The first artificial satellite
1957-First artificial satellite put into space that brings back signals to earth launched by the USSR -
Laika the dog
1957-First animal launched into orbit, dog named Laika launched by USSR and did not return alive -
First ballistic missle
1957-First ballistic missle produced by the USSR -
Sputnik 1
Sputnik 1 was the first artificial Earth satellite. The Soviet Union launched it into an elliptical low Earth orbit on 4 October 1957. It was a 58 cm diameter polished metal sphere, with four external radio antennas to broadcast radio pulses. -
First orbiting rocket
1959-First rocket launched into earths orbit by the USSR -
Solar wind
1959-First detection of solar wind by USSR -
First photograph
1959-First photograph of the earth from the earth's orbit by U.S. NAS -
First human
First human spaceflight and humanned orbital flight -
First animals and plants return to earth
1960-First plants and animals to return to earth safely/alive from the Earth's orbit -
The first women
1963-First women in space by USSR -
The first satellite
1966-First artificial satellite around another world (moon) purposed by USSR -
The men on the moon
1969-First human on moon by the U.S. (Apollo 11) successful! Neil Armstrong led Buzz Aldrin and Michael Collins on Apollo 11 landed on the moon! -
Landing on Mars
1971-First soft landing on Mars and first signals from the surface -
Columbia
April 12 - Columbia became the first Space Shuttle to be launched. -
Bruce McCandless
February 3 - Astronaut Bruce McCandless became the first man to take an untethered space walk. -
Hubble
NASA's Hubble Space Telescope was launched April 24, 1990, on the space shuttle Discovery from Kennedy Space Center in Florida -
First servicing to Hubble
December - The Space Shuttle Endeavor made the first servicing mission of the Hubble Space Telescope. -
The seven astronauts die
February 13 - An investigative panel found that superheated air almost certainly seeped through a breach in space shuttle Columbia’s left wing and possibly its wheel compartment during the craft’s fiery descent, resulting in the deaths of all seven astronauts. -
The teacher in space
August 8 - Space Shuttle Endeavour and a crew of seven blasted off with teacher-astronaut Barbara Morgan aboard as a crewmember. Morgan was the first teacher in space since the Challenger disaster in 1986. -
Lunar Crater Observation
June 18 - NASA launched the Lunar Crater Observation and Sensing Satellite, also known as LCROSS. The mission is to confirm the presence or absence of ice on the moon. On November 13, 2009, NASA scientists announced the discovery of a "significant amount" of ice in a crater near the moon’s South Pole. -
Atlantis
July 8 - The space shuttle Atlantis became the last American space shuttle to be launched into space. Mission STS-135 and its 4-member crew brought much-needed supplies and equipment to the International Space Station -
The third lunar probe launched
September 7 - NASA launched the unmanned LADEE spacecraft from NASA's Wallops Flight Facility in Virginia. It was the U.S. space agency's third lunar probe in five years. -
Repairs on the ISS
December 24 - NASA astronauts wrapped up successful repairs at the International Space Station after a rare Christmas Eve spacewalk to fix an equipment cooling system. -
Fist
1960-First plants and animals to return to earth safely/alive from the Earth's orbit -
Skylab
1971-First space station in space by USSR called Skylab
