IGY and the Sputnik Lie
from Live from the Archives Podcast
Most people who know American history have heard of Sputnik 1, the Russian satellite launched on October 7, 1957 and ushered in the Cold War Space Race. Russia's satellite, we were told, was an unprecedented and unexpected achievement that shocked the United States into action. Congress flooded federal funding into schools, established NASA, and set to beat the Russians. That response, though real, was based on a lie. Sputnik 1 was part of an worldwide collaboration to study the Earth, called the International Geophysical Year (IGY). IGY involved 66 countries and over 6000 scientists studying every aspect of the Earth, including near space. Why don't we know about IGY? What are losing by not talking about IGY? And what can it tell us about American (and global) science?
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