Thread by @cfishman

At the start of the space race, the Soviet Union really kicked American butt.

The Russians not only did almost every important space achievement first, they enjoyed beating Americans over & over.

fastcompany.com/90361743/how-t…

2/ What did the Soviets do first in space?

• 1st satellite into space (Sputnik)
• 1st creature into space (Laika)
• 1st person into space (Gagarin)
• 1st woman into space (Tereshkova)
• 1st space walk (Leonov, 1965)
• 1st photos of the far side of the Moon

3/ Those accomplishments brought out a sense of global Soviet swagger.

They also brought out the Russian sense of humor, which was often quite pointed, and also quite funny, during the Cold War.

fastcompany.com/90361743/how-t…

4/ That's #11 in the series I did last summer about the race to the Moon in the 1960s—how Apollo happened, and also how it changed life on Earth.

The Cold War was the reason we went to the Moon.

But it wasn't the reason we got there — the reason we succeeded.

#Apollo51

5/ Last summer was the 50th anniversary of the first Moon landing.

This summer, we need a story of ordinary Americans who made the impossible possible.

That is the story of the race to the Moon.

#11 to #30 in the 50-part series of short reads are here:
fastcompany.com/section/50-day…

6/ The Soviet pranks are easier to take, of course, because we know how the story ends.

The joke was on them. But there was no similar mockery from the US after the Moon landings.

And joking aside, as this week's news reminds, the US-USSR competition was always deadly serious.