Gherman Titov

Gherman Stepanovich Titov (Russian: Герман Степанович Титов; 11 September 1935 – 20 September 2000) was a Soviet and Russian cosmonaut who, on 6 August 1961, became the second human to orbit the Earth, aboard Vostok 2, preceded by Yuri Gagarin on Vostok 1. He was the fourth person in space, counting suborbital voyages of US astronauts Alan Shepard and Gus Grissom. A month short of 26 years old at launch, he is the youngest professional astronaut and was the youngest person to fly in space until 2021 when Oliver Daemen flew on Blue Origin NS-16 at the age of 18. Since Daemen flew a suborbital mission, Titov remains the youngest person to fly in Earth orbit.

Titov's flight finally proved that humans could live and work in space. He was the first person to orbit the Earth multiple times (a total of 17), the first to pilot a spaceship and to spend more than a day in space. He was also the first to sleep in orbit and to suffer from space sickness (becoming the first person to vomit in space).

Titov was the first human photographer in space: he made the first manual photographs from orbit, thus setting a record for modern first photos of Earth from space by a human (the first picture of the planet from space was shot by a V-2 rocket in 1946, launched from New Mexico). He also was the first person to film the Earth using a professional quality Konvas-Avtomat movie camera, which he used for ten minutes.

In his subsequent life Titov continued to work for the Soviet space program, and played a major role in the Spiral project where he trained to become the first pilot of an orbital spaceplane. However, after the death of Yuri Gagarin in a military aircraft accident in 1968, the Soviet government decided it could not afford to lose its second cosmonaut, and so Titov's career as test pilot ended.

Titov served in the Soviet Air Force, attaining the rank of colonel-general. In his final years in post-Soviet Russia he became a Communist politician. Despite having been chosen second, after Gagarin, to fly into space, it was Titov who later proposed the Soviet Government regularly celebrate Cosmonautics Day on April 12, the day of Gagarin's flight.

Titov was born in the village of Verkhneye Zhilino in the Altai Krai and went to school at the Stalingrad Military Aviation School. After graduating as an air force pilot, he was selected for cosmonaut training in 1960.

He flew the Vostok 2 mission launched on 6 August 1961. It lasted for 25.3 hours and he performed 17 orbits of the Earth. His call sign was Eagle (Russian: Орёл). He landed close to the town of Krasny Kut in Saratov Oblast, Russia. A month short of 26 years old at launch, he is the youngest Astronaut and remained the youngest person to fly in space until July 2021, when his record was surpassed by a Dutch teenager, Oliver Daemen. Titov was a member of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, as were almost all the Soviet cosmonauts.

Titov was a fine sportsman, and keen on gymnastics: