Astronomical observations in the USSR and the conquest of space (1934-1965)

Panorama of the Kopet-Dag Mountains.

Members of the astronomical expedition at telescopes installed on tripods.

Scientists are preparing to conduct observations.

Preparing the telescope for work.

Installing light filters.

Scientists conduct experiments on the ground.

Scientists insert a photographic plate into the telescope.

Expedition equipment.

One of the scientists invites local residents to look at the sky through a telescope.

An old Turkmen man looks into the eyepiece of the telescope.

Faces of local residents.

A girl looks into the eyepiece of the telescope.

Panorama of a site with optical equipment installed on it for observing celestial bodies.

A scientist looks into the eyepiece of the telescope.

A celestial phenomenon in the form of a bright point flying across the sky.

Members of the expedition and local residents, having climbed into the back and onto the fenders of trucks, are preparing to observe a solar eclipse through dark glass.

Filming of a solar eclipse.

A telegraph operator at a field telegraph apparatus.

A telescope aimed at the sky.

A girl looks into the eyepiece of the telescope, the sun covered by the Earth.

Local residents look at the sky through glass.

Expedition members at work.

Observing a solar eclipse through telescopes.

View of the expedition camp.

The mushroom cloud of a nuclear explosion.

An astronomer at the observatory observes stars through a telescope and explains how the telescope works.

A family at the table near the radio.

Faces of family members.

View of a city street and a building on the corner.

Radio station employees preparing to make an announcement on the radio.

View of the turrets of an ancient fortress.

People standing near the observatory building.

Communications station employees receiving signals from a Soviet satellite launched in 1957. View of the radio station building at night, lights on in the windows.

The head of the radio station begins receiving signals.

The process of assembling the first Soviet satellite. K.E. Tsiolkovsky sits in a chair in his garden in the first half of the 1930s.

Tsiolkovsky's face.

Man's first spacewalk on March 18, 1965. Academician M.M. Dubinin gives an interview.

A scientist gives an interview.

A howler horn on a ship.

A passing ship.

Taking water samples in the ship's laboratory.

Wild geese flying.

A river landscape, a steamboat on the river.

A family at a crystal set, the head of the family in headphones preparing to receive signals from the first Soviet satellite.

A river landscape.

Radio station employees preparing to receive and record signals from the satellite, checking the recording equipment.

A view of a city street, cars passing by.

Headlines of foreign newspapers and reports on the launch of the first artificial Earth satellite in the USSR. Photographs of the satellite and orbital diagrams published in newspapers.

Views of observatories in different regions of the USSR. Winter forest landscape (panorama), dome of one of the observatories.

Telescope pointed at the sky.

Telescope details.

Observatory dome in winter forest.

Observatory in the mountains, mountain landscape.

View of the dome of the mountain observatory (from above).

A car is heading to the observatory building.

Observatory dome with closed shutters.

Panorama of the observatory building with a dome on the seashore.

Domes of telescopes of one of the observatories of the USSR. The dome of the observatory with the telescope doors spread begins to turn.

The telescope is directed to the sky.

The astronomer focuses the telescope by rotating the verniers.

Preparing the telescope for work.

The telescope is controlled by a remote control.

The astronomer looks into the eyepiece of the telescope.

Types of observatory domes.