As rocket technology improved and spaceflight ... the Soviet Union sent Sputnik 1 into orbit. By 1959, both countries had set their sights on a new symbolic goal—being first to the moon.

The Vanguard rocket program, intended to showcase US technological ... Just two months earlier, the Soviet Union stunned the world by launching Sputnik 1, the first artificial satellite.

Sputnik was hurled skywards on the experimental R-7 rocket, powered by liquid oxygen mixed with kerosene, from launch facilities that are still functional and no less remote today in Tyuratam ...