Sputnik Launches
“Baikonur Cosmodrome, October 4, 1957, night. The R-7 booster rises into a Kazakh sky on a column of orange fire. Foreground shows engineers and Korolev watching from a concrete bunker through binoculars; midground reveals the launchpad gantry swinging away and steam venting; the rocket's flame illuminates the steppe for miles as the first artificial satellite climbs to orbit.”
