January 31: The first primate in space (1961)

Ham was greeted by
the Commander of
the recovery ship.

Ham, a four-year old chimpanzee, was sent to the space on a Mercury Redstone 2 rocket into suborbital flight on January 31, 1961. Ham was the first primate in space and successfully returned to the earth. During his 16.5-minute flight, Ham experienced about seven minutes of weightlessness and reached an altitude of 108 mile and a speed of 13,000 mph. His flight was to experiment the ability for human, or primate, to perform missions in space. After Ham's successful flight, NASA was ready to launch the first Mercury astronaut, Alan Shepherd, into suborbital flight three months later. On November 29, 1961, another chimpanzee Enos sent to orbit in another Mercury capsule on an Atlas rocket.  After Ham's flight, other countries did similar experiments with animals: rats by France in February 1961; mice (later guinea pigs and frogs) by the Soviet Union in March 1961; and mice and rats by China in 1964. 

January 5: Nixon announced that NASA would develop a space shuttle program (1972)

Space Shuttle Discovery

US President Richard Nixon announced that NASA would develop a space shuttle program to reduce the space exploration cost by using a reusable spacecraft. Since 1969, Nixon had supported proceeding with space shuttle development. Fundamental research about space shuttle had been performed and a program for the development of a space shuttle was announced on January 5, 1972.  Three months later, the US Congress approved the funding for the space shuttle program. As a result, five space shuttles were built: Columbia, Challenger, Discovery, Atlantis, and Endeavour. Apart from these five, a mockup (Inspiration) and a test shuttle (Enterprise) were built. The first space-worthy Space Shuttle Columbia's flight happened from April 12 to April 14 in 1981. Columbia broke apart during re-entry in 2003. Another space shuttle Challenger was destroyed in 73 second after launch and all seven crew members were died in 1986. Though there were some disasters and failures, the Space Shuttle had accomplished a number of successful space missions. NASA retired the Space Shuttle in 2011 after 30 years of great service.

December 14: Mariner 2 flew by Venus (1962)

Mariner 2

Mariner 2, an American space probe to Venus, made the first space probe to successfully encounter a planet. Mariner 2 flew by Venus, which is the nearest planet from earth, on December 14, 1962 and scanned the planet with its dual radiometers and sent the collected information back to NASA. It was the first planetary data collection from a man-made spacecraft through a physical encounter with the planet. Mariner 2 also measured the solar wind and interplanetary dust on its way to Venus. Since its launch on August 27, 1962, Mariner 2 traveled for 109 days and then passed Venus at its closest distance of 35,000km. On December 27, 1962, spacecraft perihelion occurred at 105,464,560km and the last transmission was received from Mariner 2 on January 3, 1963. It was almost 50 years ago. It seems we were more adventurous and more audacious than we now are.