At the dawn of the space race, even before placing the first artificial satellite in orbit – the Sputnik 1 – scientists from the Soviet Union dreamed of a compatriot walking on the Moon. A series of slides drawn in 1955 illustrate how they imagined the first crewed trip to our natural satellite 20 years later, in 1975. This is very interesting material, and in many respects resembles what NASA would finally achieve in 1969.
A Dream From a Cave
Man has dreamed of stepping on the Moon since he watched it sitting by a campfire at the entrance of his cave. But it wasn't until the Industrial Revolution proved that machines could truly turn that dream into reality that humanity knew with certainty that someday one of its representatives would finally walk on the surface of our natural satellite.
Jules Verne imagined a wonderful journey aboard a cannonball, which although not feasible in practice – for example, the crew would die crushed inside the projectile – was the first attempt to describe with scientific thoroughness the problems that must be solved to send an object to the Moon.
But it was in the mid-20th century that, thanks to technology derived from the two World Wars, we knew it wasn't long before that dream would become reality. In 1955, scientists from the Soviet Union working on what would finally become the first artificial satellite of our planet, the Sputnik 1, in 1957, believed that in about 20 years they could walk on the Moon. And they put their ideas into a series of slides.
Looking at them today, some of these hand-drawn images (PowerPoint was decades away) from 1955 may seem almost naive. The accompanying texts sometimes become a plain advertising brochure. But most of the ideas they express are completely realistic and strictly adhere to the knowledge available at the time.
The epic told by this series of slides begins when a rocket designed by the Russian space agency takes off toward the Moon. Like some scientists propose today, instead of using a conventional rocket with vertical launch and several "disposable" stages, the Russians of 1955 thought it was a good idea to use the slope of a mountain – Mount Kazbek – for launching the vehicle.
That would allow them to save fuel and reduce the rocket's complexity. As can be read, on November 25, 1975, exactly at 10 in the morning, the cosmonauts would depart toward the Moon, seeking to become the first humans to reach it. After firing the engines for 25 seconds, the ship travels at about 600 meters per second (about 2,160 kilometers per hour). Seven minutes later, the engines shut off and Luna 1 flies through space.
Two hours later you can see the relaxed cosmonauts enjoying their trip. They have traveled 39,000 kilometers, and they can see the Earth as no one ever saw it. The Luna 1 is spacious, and its occupants have radio and television receivers.
The doctor on board periodically checks the health of the cosmonauts and sends their vital signs to Earth, where the support team ensures everything goes as planned. On November 27 at 11:12, the cosmonauts announce that the journey is coming to an end, so they will fire the engines to begin braking. The Moon, enormous, is closer than ever.
Soon after, the Russian astronauts land on the Moon. In the corresponding slides it can be read that their footprints will last for centuries, printed on the fine dust covering the Moon. In 1969, it would be the commander of Apollo 11, Neil Armstrong, who would stamp the first human footprint on that spot.
The cosmonauts would explore the Moon, using spacesuits that – according to what can be guessed from the drawings – would be flexible and light. The low gravity of our satellite would allow them to use poles to jump over the small faults in the terrain. Throughout the entire series of slides, realistic elements are mixed with others that – seen many years later – seem somewhat childish.
The Legacy of the Slides
But despite being somewhat naive, this series of slides shows that even in the early stages of the space race, the goal of the Russian space agency was to put a man on the Moon. The ship seen in these drawings was never built, but inspired by their dreams, scientists built many robotic vehicles that orbited and landed on the Moon, and even brought back samples of its soil.
The Luna 9 mission, for example, successfully landed on February 3 and sent photographs to Earth. And the Luna 24 mission, the last of that series, landed on August 18, 1976, dug a 2-meter-deep well and returned to Earth with 170 grams of lunar soil samples. Unfortunately, they never managed to take a cosmonaut to our natural satellite, but they achieved other impressive successes. Sometimes dreaming is a fundamental part of any endeavor. Don't you think?
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