"Are you really from space?" The earthlings met Yuri Gagarin with this question

Sergey Baimukhametov

American science fiction writer Ray Bradbury then said: "This can be compared with a historical, biological fact - with the emergence of fish on land".

His words became visionary. Because the future of mankind is connected with the development of the Near and then the Far Space. Now it is impossible to imagine in detail, it is inconceivable, but we understand that this is so - according to the logic of development.

In other words, we became aware of our involvement in space. That was reflected then in mass art, in the same super popular songs "Grass by the house (Earth in the window"), "Fourteen minutes before the start," We are the children of the Galaxy.

For Soviet and Russian people, this feeling of belonging to the Cosmos is also connected with the fact that Yuri Gagarin is ours. And for some - directly with the fact that their relatives and friends took part in that stellar project.

My father-in-law Anatoly Abramovich Braude (1918-2008), half a century, from 1941 to 1991, worked in the aviation, rocket and space industry, was a leading designer. In his institute (graduated from the Moscow Aviation Institute in 1941) specialty "gunsmith", he was engaged in many topics, but most of all - in ejection systems. He was one of those who developed and introduced into mass production all-mode ejection installations.

And now, when sometimes news comes about pilots who escaped by ejection, we in our family say: "This is our grandfather...".

He was also one of the authors, developers and designers of the descent vehicle of the Vostok-1 spacecraft, the very vehicle on which the world's first cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin landed.

We have a notebook with his memories at home. A copy is in the museum of the Iskra Design Bureau, it was written specially for the anniversary of the enterprise. Here is a fragment as one of the documents of that era:

“In 1959, Lev Penin and I were invited to the LII by the head of laboratory No. 24 (rescue equipment), Guy Severin. (LII - Flight Research Institute, scientific center and a special airfield. Guy Ilyich Severin, 1926 - 2008, Hero of Socialist Labor, academician - S.B.) He suggested that we modify (shorten) our telescopic firing mechanism TSM-1880-52, already manufactured in series for Sukhoi airplanes. The purpose of the revision is to place the mechanism in a 2-meter ball for ejection of a special chair from this ball.

After a moment's thought, we offered not to modify the TCM, but to develop a new, relatively simple, two-cylinder firing mechanism. The "ball" with an armchair was supposed to be used for the first manned flight into space.

This is how the theme "EAST" began. We reported to Kartukov and got down to work. (Ivan Ivanovich Kartukov, 1904-1991, Lenin Prize laureate, designer of rocketry, at that time - chief designer of KB-2 of plant number 81 (NII-125). The names of the KB-plants often changed, their own called them simply "the firm". Now OKB "Iskra" named after I. I. Kartukov. - S. B.)

All work was carried out under the general supervision of S.P. Queen.

Hundreds of organizations took part in it. Only our affairs, directly related to the "ball", which later turned into a satellite ship "VOSTOK", was handled by one of the sectors of the Royal firm, headed by K.P. Feoktistov, OKB S.M. Alekseev (ejection seat), OKB I.I. Kartukova (firing mechanism and a number of units), Research Institute of Parachute Engineering F.D. Tkachev, Chachikyan Design Bureau (automatic devices), A.F. Misurkin is a leading engineer for squibs of the Ammunition Institute and, finally, a representative of the LII G.I. Severin, coordinating all the work of these organizations on the "ship" and its stuffing.

Penin, myself, Lakeev, Shkarpet, Nazarov, Chizhikov, Shumovsky and others continued to work hard at the KB.

In the spring of 1961, we completed the testing of a set of assemblies for the Vostok satellite. And finally, on April 12, 1961 it happened..."

Gagarin's descent vehicle, "Shar", on April 12, 1961, landed on a collective farm field near the villages of Smelovka and Ternovka, 27 kilometers from the city of Engels, Saratov Region.

The first on Earth to meet the first cosmonaut was the wife of a local forester, Anna Takhtarova, with her six-year-old granddaughter Rita. Yuri Gagarin said: “Stepping on solid ground, I saw a woman and a girl standing near a spotted calf and watching me with curiosity. I went to them. They - to meet... "Ours, comrades, ours!", - Feeling a chill of excitement, I shouted, taking off my helmet. "Really from space?" the woman asked not quite confidently. "Imagine, yes", - I said"

At this point, they immediately dug in a wooden post with a board: “Do not touch. 04/12/61. 10h 55m Moscow time".

On April 10, 2021, the Space Conquerors Park was opened on the Gagarin Field.

Happy Cosmonautics Day!