Curated atlas · Space

Apollo and the Space Race

A detailed weekly timeline of the Space Race, from the shock of Sputnik through the Mercury, Gemini, and Apollo programs to the post-Apollo Skylab era.

20 years

1,040 blocks

21 events

5 stages

1 block = 1 week · 1 row = 52 weeks20y · 1,040 blocks

1957

1962

1967

1972

Stages

Timeline ledger

Chronicle

21 events · 5 stages

Early Space Race

4y 21w

Jan 1, 1957 → May 23, 1961

Sputnik 1 launched

Oct 1, 1957

Laika — first animal in orbit

Oct 29, 1957

Explorer 1 — first US satellite

Jan 28, 1958

NASA established

Jul 29, 1958

Luna 2 reaches the Moon

Sep 8, 1959

Yuri Gagarin orbits Earth

Apr 11, 1961

Alan Shepard — first American in space

May 2, 1961

Mercury & Gemini programs

5y 26w

May 23, 1961 → Nov 15, 1966

JFK's Moon goal speech

May 23, 1961

John Glenn orbits Earth

Feb 20, 1962

Valentina Tereshkova — first woman in space

Jun 11, 1963

First spacewalk (Leonov)

Mar 16, 1965

First US spacewalk (Ed White)

Jun 1, 1965

Apollo development & testing

1y 47w

Nov 15, 1966 → Oct 8, 1968

Apollo 1 fire

Jan 24, 1967

Apollo 7 — first crewed Apollo

Oct 8, 1968

Moon landing era

4y 1w

Dec 17, 1968 → Dec 19, 1972

Apollo 8 — first lunar orbit

Dec 17, 1968

Apollo 11 — Moon landing

Jul 15, 1969

Apollo 13 — 'Houston, we've had a problem'

Apr 7, 1970

Apollo 15 — first lunar rover

Jul 20, 1971

Apollo 17 — last Moon mission

Dec 5, 1972

Post-Apollo: Skylab & détente

2y 30w

Dec 26, 1972 → Jul 22, 1975

Skylab space station launched

May 8, 1973

Apollo-Soyuz Test Project

Jul 15, 1975

Want to build your own?

Create a personal atlas to lay out a life, trace a project, or keep any long span visible.

Create an atlas