The USSR responds to the announcement made by the US of their intention to launch the 1st artificial satellite into space by launching a satellite of their own.

The USSR successfully launches Sputnik 1 into space, the first Earth-orbiting satellite in history.

The USSR successfully launched Sputnik 2 into space, which carried a dog named Laika into space. They become the first nation to successfully send a living organism into the orbit.

The US finally enters the Space Race by launching Explorer 1, the 1st US satellite to reach orbit. It also carried experimental equipment which led to the discovery of the Van Allen radiation belt.

The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) was created in the US and replaced the National Advisory Committee on Aeronautics (NACA).

The US launched SCORE, the 1st communications satellite. It captured the entire world's attention by broadcasting a pre-recorded Christmas message from US President Dwight D. Eisenhower, becoming the first broadcast of a human voice from space.

The USSR launched Luna 1, known as the first "cosmic rocket" as it inadvertently escaped the orbit of the Moon due to the object carrying too much velocity. Luna 1 became the 1st human-made object to exit the orbit of the Earth and orbit the sun instead!

The US launched Explorer 6, the world's 1st weather satellite and obtained the first few images of the Earth from outer space.

The USSR launched Luna 2 into space and managed to accomplish its mission of creating the 1st spacecraft to ever reach the surface of the Moon.

The USSR launched Luna 3 and succeeded in their mission of sending an object into orbit around the Moon and photographed the far side of the Moon.

The USSR launched Luna 5, which had two dogs named Belka and Strelka as well as a range of plants on board. They became the first animals and plants to return to earth from space alive.

Ham, a US chimpanzee, became the first hominid (or great ape) to be sent into space and the first of its kind to successfully survive after landing

The Soviet Union achieved a clear triumph in the Space Race. Aboard the Vostok 1, Yuri Gagarin made 1 entire orbit around the Earth and became the first man to ever reach space. He remained in space for a total of one hour and forty-eight minutes before landing back on Earth in Saratov Oblast, west Russia.

Valentina Tereshkova became the 1st civilian as well as the 1st woman to be in space. She spent almost three days in space, orbiting the Earth an astonishingly 48 times aboard her spacecraft, Vostok 6.

Alexei Leonov left his spacecraft, the Voskhod 2, in a specialized spacesuit and conducted the first ever twelve-minute spacewalk.

The US satellite, Mariner 4, performed the first successful voyage to the planet Mars, and returned with the first close-up images of the Martian surface.

This year proved to be the most deadly in the Space Race for both sides, the US and Soviet Union. In January, American astronauts Ed White, Gus Grissom, and Roger Chaffee died due to a fire ignition within their Apollo 1 capsule on the launch pad. A few months later the Soviet cosmonaut Vladimir Komarov was also killed when the parachute on his Soyuz 1 capsule failed to open upon his re-entry into Earth's atmosphere.

US spacecraft Apollo 8 became the first human-crewed spacecraft to reach the Moon, orbit it, and successfully return to Earth.

Neil Armstrong and later Edwin "Buzz" Aldrin became the first two men to walk on the Moon while their crewmate Michael Collins continued to orbit the Moon aboard the Apollo 11. This secured a victory for America in the Space Race with a televised landing that was witnessed around the world by a total of 723 million people.

The USSR launched the first space station. Parts of this spacecraft would eventually become core segments of the International Space Station (ISS) almost thirty years on in November 2000.

David Scott, commander of the Apollo 15 mission, became the first ever person to drive on the Moon. He's also remembered for paying tribute to the Soviet Union and US astronauts who died in the advancement of space exploration. While walking on the Moon, Scott placed a plaque with a list of all the dead. Alongside this, he left a small aluminium sculpture of an astronaut in a spacesuit, created by Belgian artist Paul Van Hoeydonck.

With tensions between the US and USSR softening, the first cooperative Apollo-Soyuz mission was launched. With two separate flights, the Apollo and Soyuz spacecraft docked in space and the two commanders Tom Stafford and Alexei Leonov exchanged the first international handshake. This act can be seen to symbolically end the Space Race, paving the way for future joint missions, such as the International Space Station and the Shuttle-Mir programme.

The rover was the first wheeled vehicle to rove another planet, and was part of the Mars Pathfinder mission. It had front and rear cameras and hardware to conduct several scientific experiments.