1968 - Exploration, Colonization

Exploration, Colonization

Soviet cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin dies in a plane crash near Moscow March 27 at age 34. (Another pilot is also killed in the crash of the two-seat jet.) Gagarin was the first man in space and in recent years has been demoted for using his position as a hero of the Soviet Union to speak out in support of dissidents, but his ashes are interred in a niche in the Kremlin wall and the town of Gzhatsk (he was born nearby) is renamed Gagarin.

The U.S. Apollo 7 mission from October 11 to 22 is the first manned flight of Apollo Command and Service modules. Astronauts on the mission include civilian physicist R. (Ronnie) Walter Cunningham, 36, who was a Marine Corps fighter pilot from 1953 to 1956 (see moon landing, 1969).