1907–1966
Serhii Korolov
Chief Designer of the space age
Two decades before he sent Gagarin into space, he was thrown into a labor camp in Kolyma. Serhii Korolov, a rocket designer from Zhytomyr, led the launches of the first Earth satellite and the first human in space.
Key accomplishments
- Led the development of the R-7, the first intercontinental ballistic missile
- Launch of the first artificial Earth satellite (4 October 1957)
- First human spaceflight, by Yuri Gagarin (12 April 1961)
From Kolyma to space
In 1938 Serhii Korolov was arrested without grounds during Stalin’s terror and sentenced to 10 years. He went through interrogations and a labor camp in Kolyma, then worked in a prison design bureau. Two decades later, the first human flew into space under his leadership.
A boy hooked on rockets
Korolov was born in 1907 in Zhytomyr and spent his childhood in Nizhyn, Kyiv and Odesa. He began his studies at the Kyiv Polytechnic Institute and graduated from the Moscow Higher Technical School. As a young man he fell for gliders and rockets: in 1933 his group launched one of the first Soviet liquid-fuel rockets.
Sputnik and Gagarin
After his release in 1944 Korolov became chief designer of long-range ballistic missiles, and later headed the leading rocket and space center. Under his leadership the R-7 rocket was built. It put the first artificial Earth satellite into orbit (1957) and then the Vostok spacecraft with Yuri Gagarin (1961). The world learned who Korolov was only after his death in 1966.
Why it matters today
Korolov worked for the state that had thrown him into a labor camp. His story is about the talent of a man born in Ukraine who changed human history, and about how a totalitarian system used and silenced its creators. A museum named after him operates in Zhytomyr.
