When you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission. Here’s how it works. The successful launch of the Soviet Union's first two satellites prompted U.S. President Dwight D ...

When the Cold War heated up in 1946, the U.S. and the Soviet Union took their rivalry from Earth to the stars. Sputnik, the ...

— -- In 1957, Thomas Stafford looked down on the Soviet Union. The launch of Sputnik I forced him to change his mind — and set him on a course to the moon. An Air Force fighter pilot in the ...

WASHINGTON — President Obama's State of the Union address last week detailed an ambitious set of goals for the country in terms of technology and innovation. He stressed investments were needed in ...

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. -- Embarking on a mission that scientists have been dreaming of since the Sputnik era, a NASA spacecraft hurtled Sunday toward the sun on a quest to unlock some of its mysteries ...

Forty years ago, Sputnik and the Soviets set the course for a space race with the West. Now the satellite, the space race - and even the Soviet Union itself - are gone. But Sputnik’s legacy endures.

The space agency was officially created with a stroke of President Eisenhower's pen. But first, there were months of anxiety, failure and frenzied lawmaking, Eric Mack has been a CNET contributor ...

A model of Sputnik, the little orb that could. Image: NASA View Slideshow The standard Sputnik story goes like this: It was the launch of this metal ball that forced the United States to elevate the ...

The Soviet Union kicked off the Space Age 50 years ago this week by firing a basketball-size satellite called Sputnik into orbit, where its feeble "beep… beep ...

Fifty years ago, science fiction became science fact. On Oct. 4, 1957, the Soviet Union, having worked in complete secrecy, launched Sputnik I. Humankind's first man-made satellite, a tiny ball that ...

Forbes contributors publish independent expert analyses and insights. I cover the history of science and exploration. The object that started the Space Race was small and deceptively simple. Sputnik 1 ...