Saturday night was the global celebration of Yuri’s Night, the evening set aside to commemorate the time that separates all of history in twain: the time before humans went into space, and the time after.
Yuri Gagarin, on April 12, 1961, became the first human to travel into space.
40 years later, Loretta Whitesides (who was just attending the Conference on World Affairs here in Boulder), George T. Whitesides, and Trish Garner created Yuri’s Night. It’s been celebrated ever since. Festivities take place around the world, and it’s quite a party.
Until Saturday I’ve never attended one; in general a lot of conferences are held in April and I always wound up missing the event. But this time I was invited to attend the Yuri’s Night in Boulder, sponsored by The Secure World Foundation, which
…envisions a global space commons that is free from threat and available for the benefit of all humanity. The Foundation is dedicated to supporting steps that strengthen global security and lead to an international law-based system with reliable enforcement. These steps include confidence building and the development of cooperative norms, regulations, and rules of conduct.
Sounds good to me.
The first part of the event was a VIP party (heh, me at a VIP party… at least Paris wasn’t there) and it was rolling by the time I showed up. I had never been to the Trilogy bar in downtown Boulder, but I quickly made myself at home. One cool thing (among many) about Boulder is that it is home to a lot of space-based industry, and so I knew several people there, including Leonard David from space.com, asteroid expert Clark Chapman, and Carolyn Porco from the Cassini mission. I had many good conversations (including some that will eventually be blog posts) as well as excellent coconut shrimp. Yum!
But then it was time for the commemorative toast to Yuri. Special shotglasses with vodka were handed out, and a fine speech was made to honor Yuri. Then I drank the vodka, and even now days later my throat still burns a bit (what, they couldn’t have used chilled Stoli?). After that the party moved to the back, but I had to go home. I had things to do and blog posts to write, but I still had to stop and chat with the guy wearing the goofy Sputnik helmet.
I also chatted with a woman named Cassie, a graduate student at CU, who wants to make a career somehow out of merging her passion for engineering and journalism (hmmm, sounds familiar). She was young, enthusiastic, smart, and wants very much to encourage and support our efforts to explore space. Before I left, I looked once more around the bar, and saw a crowd filled with people like Cassie trying to make sure that Yuri Gagarin’s first step doesn’t falter, but is instead the prelude to millions more.
I think, with folks like this, we have a very interesting future ahead of us.
April 14th, 2008 at 12:56 pm
Bah! Blooody Russkies. (kicks pebble)
April 14th, 2008 at 1:08 pm
I soooo wish I had known about this! I feel a little left out, actually…
April 14th, 2008 at 1:39 pm
Wikipedia notes that some have proposed that Yuri was the first person to “successfully” enter space and return, but there were other cosmonauts before him that came back dead or in some similar condition. Those missions, as the thought goes, were state secrets and thus have been excluded from historical narrative. Wikipedia further notes the lack of substantiation of these ideas, which could be the real reason we don’t talk about others in space before Yuri.
Phil, do you have a blog entry or two that you’d like to make on this topic? It seems like a good Bad Astronomy subject.
April 14th, 2008 at 1:47 pm
Why do I always find out about this stuff one day too late?
April 14th, 2008 at 2:08 pm
I can’t tell whether that “Secure World Foundation” is a good thing (e.g. stronger encryption algorithms), or a bad thing (e.g. big-brother-like surveillance for “terrorists”).
April 14th, 2008 at 2:50 pm
Gosh Phil, can we clink glasses to Yuri and Al on Thursday? (Al was a friend, and one of my favourite people)
April 14th, 2008 at 3:22 pm
I’m not Phil but I have done some research into Phantom Cosmonauts and they seem to be an urban legend, one part wishful thinking (it’s a dramatic story that sounds good and plausible) and the fact that Russian Archivists can’t or won’t release the material from that time period that would corroborate the story one way or the other. The Mythbusters would call it Plausible, but inconclusive.
If anyone has other info, of course, I’d love to hear it!
April 14th, 2008 at 4:02 pm
Where I lived in Manitowoc, Wisconsin there was a little plaque in the sidewalk. It said that a piece of Sputnik had fallen there! The local museum had a replica bit that NASA had given them. I thought the plaque should have said something like “If you had been standing on this spot on April blah blah blah….you would be dead”.
April 14th, 2008 at 4:05 pm
I lived on North 9th street.
http://www.roadsideamerica.com/geo/showMap.php?attractionNo=12959
April 14th, 2008 at 4:36 pm
I owe you a story about pass-making cosmonauts.
April 14th, 2008 at 7:00 pm
We celebrated virually on MuseBlog, and in the real world, I called a radio station to recommend “Rocket Man”. Sadly, the host didn’t get my call.
April 14th, 2008 at 9:58 pm
I forgot all about Yuri’s night until Friday. So Friday I did a quick google and found our local event (San Antonio). We had a great time. We didn’t have vodka or anything like that (I understand Austin probably did). We did have Pizza. Mmmmm, pepperoni… I digress…
Anyway, mark it on your calendars now! (Um. You might not have your 2009 calendar yet, so might be a futile suggestion). Start planning now! Any reason to party is a good reason - this is a great reason.
[soapbox]
Also, consider looking into your local National Space Society, or one of the other major science support groups. Support science. Get involved.
[/soapbox]
I digressed again, didn’t I.
John B. Sandlin
April 15th, 2008 at 11:17 am
Robert Heinlein reported that on a trip to the USSR in 1960, a bunch of cadets (a stage above Young Pioneers, I forget the exact term for them) told him about how the USSR had put a man into orbit. People were talking about it all over. Then, a day or two later, nobody said anything about it and you couldn’t get them to talk about it. Yuri went up in 1961, if I remember correctly.
Now, this doesn’t prove a fatal early space mission. It might just be that someone started a rumor and Heinlein happened to hear it when it was still propagating. But it’s certianly compatible with a fatal early space mission.
April 15th, 2008 at 12:24 pm
@ John B. Sandlin,
*Flips calendar to April 2009*
Hm, looks like April 12, 2009 is Easter Sunday. That should make for some interesting parties.
April 15th, 2008 at 5:03 pm
I am amazed that guy with the Sputnik helmet did not poke out someone’s eye with those backward thrusting, eye level, antennae. Fool.
April 15th, 2008 at 7:23 pm
@tracer
To answer your question, Secure World uses more of a Google-style approach to things as opposed to Microsoft. Their main focus is on keeping space free from conflict (as in no shooting wars) and sustainable for future generations to use and explore.
http://secureworldfoundation.org
I’ve been working for them as a consultant for the last 6 months after getting out of the USAF and they are respected by both the left and right as straight shooters.
April 16th, 2008 at 1:10 am
@PsyberDave
The “lost cosmonauts” theory was vaguely plausible before the USSR collapsed (they did lie and cover up plenty of real incidents), but with the evidence that has become public since then it is completely unsupportable.
Even before that, Jim Oberg did a pretty good debunking: http://www.jamesoberg.com/usd10.html
The real history of the soviet program had plenty of interesting incidents. I suggest Asif A Siddiqis excellent Challenge to Apollo as a starting points. Obergs books also come highly recommended.
April 16th, 2008 at 1:35 am
PS: you can get a rather poor PDF scan of “Challenge to Apollo” on the NASA NTRs server:
http://ntrs.nasa.gov/archive/nasa/casi.ntrs.nasa.gov/20000088626_2000122281.pdf
The PDF is legal, but I’d strongly suggest getting the real book if you can find/afford it.
April 16th, 2008 at 7:05 am
[…] died during the flight. The Soviets flew 10 more dogs on that programme until April 12, 1961 when Yuri Gagarin became the first man in […]
April 16th, 2008 at 9:13 am
Phil,
It was great to have you join us at the celebration. My only regret was not getting a chance to meet you. There will be other opportunities, in any case.
I think the event went very well, actually. But just wait until next year!
Best,
Phil Smith
Director of Communications
Secure World Foundation