Today is exactly fifty years ago that the Soviet cosmonaut, Yuri Gagarin, became the first man to journey into outer pace. He and the USSR stunned the world when he achieved this on April 12th, 1961.
Gagarin, who became beloved the world over not only for his amazing feat, but also for his easy smile and charming boyishness, was a pioneer like very few seen in the 20th century. I wasn't even born when Yuri did his famous flight, yet I heard so much about him growing up from my elders. There had already been other space-age heroes like the first man to orbit the Earth, John Glenn, or the first men on the moon, Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin, but somehow none of them seemed to be recalled so fondly as Yuri Gagarin.
By the way, I thought the banner today on Google especially fitting in its look and design in commemoration of this special date in human history:
Perhaps there was nostalgia for Yuri when I was younger due to the fact that he was killed so tragically in 1968 whilst a pilot in training on a Mig-15 fighter jet. Perhaps it seemed unfair and especially poignant to that generation that this smiling, affable hero of the burgeoning space era had been killed so young.
Be that as it may, Yuri Gagarin will forever be etched in my memory as the first of the known and beloved space heroes. And in this cynical day and age in which heroes seem so few and far between, even non-existent, then his heroism forever etched in black-and-white photos and footage seems even more poignant and resonant.
There were other space heroes, and no doubt many people who made that space flight possible back in April 1961, but none of them could carry it so perfectly on their shoulders as did the wonderful Yuri Gagarin.
I hope you're smiling up in the stars where you belong, Yuri.
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