Communist Party of Canada - Parti Communiste du Canada

22 h ·

Happy birthday, comrade Yuri Gagarin!

Gagarin was born on March 9, 1934, in Klushino in the western part of the Soviet Union, the third of four children in his family. His two older siblings had been enslaved in a Nazi concentration camp.

Gagarin became the first person in space at the age of 27 on April 12, 1961 at 9:15AM. The orbit lasted 108 minutes before Gagarin returned to Earth, ejecting from the capsule seven kilometres above the ground and parachuting to Earth. Upon landing he reportedly came across a startled 6-year-old girl and her grandmother on a farm and said: “Don’t be afraid, I am a Soviet citizen like you, who has descended from space and I must find a telephone to call Moscow!”

A couple of days prior to his flight, Gagarin wrote a farewell letter to his wife Valentina in case he died during the flight. When the flight ended successfully, the letter was forgotten; however, Valentina received the letter in 1968 following a flight accident on March 27, 1968 which claimed Gagarin's life.