The first person to ever walk on the moon was Neil Armstrong, in 1969. As he was climbing off the shuttle, he put his left foot on the surface and said "That's one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind" . That became a famous saying for Americans. He described that the moon's surface felt like powdered charcoal. Neil Armstrong spent his first few minutes on the moon taking pictures, collecting soil samples and rocks. Then Aldrin, his partner, joined him in collecting samples. They were scheduled to leave at 1750 GMT that evening.

Neil Armstrong

Europe sent a satellite to space on October 4, 1957. The satellite was the first ever man-made object to leave Earth and go into space. Later that year on November 3, the Russians sent a dog into space. Next year on February 1, 1958, the U.S. built and launched their first satellite into space. It was named "Explorer" . A few years later on March 14, 1960 a radio telescope made history. It made contact with the American, " Pioneer V Satellite". It was nearly 407,000 miles away! On April 26, 1962 the first U.S. rocket landed on the moon.

Radio Telescope
 

Russian Dog

On March 24, 1965, thousands of people watched a live broadcast of a space probe crashing in to the moon just 15 minutes after it left Earth's atmosphere. It fell from a height of 1,468 miles from the moon, but it burned out before it hit Earth.

Project Mercury began in 1958 and ended in 1963. It had 6 flights. The goals of Project Mercury were; to launch a spacecraft with 6 men inside, orbit the Earth once, see how the men function in space, and to get all the men and the spacecraft back to Earth safely. Project Mercury successfully completed all of it's goals.

Project Gemini started December 7, 1961 and ended January 3, 1962. It had 12 flights. It had a two man crew. Project Gemini's goals were to subject people and equipment to space flight, and to dock with other orbiting vehicles. The two men completed all of these goals.

As a child Allan Shepherd always wanted to be an astronaut. He ended up in the Navy when he grew up. While he was in the Navy he studied to be an astronaut. When he was 37 years old  he became the first U.S. astronaut that was in the Navy. May 5, 1961, he went into space in a shuttle by himself. He traveled 115 minutes in space. Before he  landed he realized that he was going to land in the Antarctic Ocean close to the U.S., so he called for a helicopter to pick him up. When the helicopter picked him up his first words on board was "Boy, what a ride!".

In 1986, five men and two women died in an explosion that happened just a few second after the space shuttle, Challenger, was launched in Cape Canaveral, Florida. Millions of people watched this explosion on live tv!

Credits:

http://seds.lpl.arizona.edu/nineplanets/nineplanets/nineplanets.html
http://www.bbc.co.uk/science/space/exploration/missiontimeline/index.shtml
http://www-pao.ksc.nasa.gov/kscpao/history/mercury/mercury.htm

http://www.aerospaceguide.net/spacehistory/
http://spaceflight.nasa.gov/history/

Neil Armstrong – picture
http://news.bbc.co.uk/onthisday/hi/dates/stories/july/21/newsid_2635000/2635845.stm

Space Shuttle Disaster picture
http://news.bbc.co.uk/onthisday/hi/dates/stories/july/21/newsid_2635000/2635845.stm