October 4, 1957

 - Sputnik 1, the first man-made object to orbit the Earth, is launched by the U.S.S.R., and remains in orbit until January 4, 1958.

November 3, 1957 - Sputnik 2, carrying the dog Laika for 7 days in orbit, is launched by the U.S.S.R., and remains in orbit until April 13, 1958.

April 12, 1961 - Vostok 1 is launched by the U.S.S.R., carrying Cosmonaut Yuri A. Gargarin, the first man in space. He orbits the Earth once.

May 5, 1961 - Mercury Freedom 7 carries Alan B. Shepard,Jr., the first U.S. Astronaut into space, in a suborbital flight.

February 20, 1962 - Mercury Friendship 7 lifts off with John H. Glenn, Jr., the first American in orbit, and orbits the Earth three times.

June 16, 1963 - Vostok 6 carries Soviet Cosmonaut Valentia Tereshkova, the first woman in space and orbits the Earth 48 times.

March 23, 1965 - First manned flight of the Gemini program, Gemini 3 carrying Virgil I. Grissom and John W. Young. Made three orbits around the earth.

December 4, 1965 - Gemini 7 is launched carrying Frank Borman and James A. Lovell, Jr., making 206 orbits around Earth and proving a trip to the Moon possible.

1967: Three astronauts die in Apollo 1 tragedy- a fire in a prelaunch test kills all three astronauts, including Roger B. Chaffee of Grand Rapids.

December 21, 1968 - Apollo 8 is launched with Frank Borman, James A. Lovell, Jr. and William A. Anders, the first Apollo to use the Saturn V rocket, and the first manned spacecraft to orbit the Moon, making 10 orbits on its 6-day mission.

July 20, 1969 - Neil Armstrong and Edwin Aldrin, Jr. make the first manned soft landing on the Moon, and the first moonwalk, using Apollo 11.

April 11, 1970 - Apollo 13 is launched, suffering an explosion in its SM oxygen tanks. Its Moon landing is aborted, and the crew, James A. Lovell, Jr., John L. Swigert, Jr. and Fred W. Haise, Jr., return safely.

January 31, 1971 - Apollo 14 moon mission is launched by the U.S. with the legendary Alan Shepard, along with Stuart Roosa and Edgar Mitchell on board. They land in the planned Apollo 13 site, the Fra Mauro highlands, which they explore with the help of a two-wheeled cart that permits the transport of a significantly greater quantity of lunar material than previous missions. Shepard becomes the first man to hit a golf ball on the moon.

July, 1975 - American Apollo (18) and Soviet Soyuz 19 dock, the first international spacecraft rendezvous.

July 20, 1976 - Pictures of the Martian surface are taken by Viking 1, the first U.S. attempt to soft land a spacecraft on another planet.

April 12, 1981 - The first manned mission of the Space Transportation System (STS-1), Columbia , is launched.

June 19, 1983 - Sally K. Ride is the first U.S. woman to travel in space, on Challenger mission STS-7.

January 28, 1986 - The space shuttle Challenger explodes shortly after liftoff of mission STS-51L.

July 4, 1997 - Mars Pathfinder becomes the first probe to successfully land on Mars since Viking 2 in 1976. It is also the first planetary probe to include a separate roving robot probe (Sojourner) since the Soviet Union's Luna 21 in 1973.

Shuttle Columbia disaster during spaceflight on reentry - disintegrated over Texas on February 1, 2003. The entire crew of seven died.

Space Shuttles Retired- 2011