Valentina Vladimirovna Tereshkova is the first woman in space, now a retired Soviet cosmonaut.
Valentina Vladimirovna was born on March 6, 1937 in a small village in the Yaroslavl Oblast in western Russia. Tereshkova’s father was a tractor driver and her mother worked in a textile plant.
She began school in 1945 at the age of eight, but left school in 1953 and continued her education by correspondence courses. She became interested in parachuting from a young age, and trained in parachuting at the local Aeroclub, making her first jump at age 22 on 21 May 1959.
It was her expertise in parachute jumping that led to her selection as a cosmonaut. Tereshkova was a textile-factory assembly worker and an amateur parachutist when she was recruited into the cosmonaut program.
Sergey Korolyov, the chief Soviet rocket engineer, came up with the idea of putting a woman in space. On 16 February 1962, Valentina Tereshkova was selected to join the female cosmonaut corps. Tereshkova was considered a particularly worthy candidate, partly due to her “proletarian” background, and because her father, tank leader sergeant Vladimir Tereshkov, was a war hero. He lost his life in the Finnish Winter War during World War II in the Lemetti area in Finnish Karelia.
Tereshkova was two years old at the time of her father’s death. After her mission she was asked how the Soviet Union should thank her for her service to the country. Tereshkova asked that the government search for, and publish, the location where her father was killed in action. This was done, and a monument now stands at the site in Lemetti—now on the Russian side of the border. Tereshkova has since visited Finland several times.
After watching the successful launch of Vostok 5 on June 14, Tereshkova began final preparations for her own flight. On the morning of 16 June 1963, Tereshkova and her back-up Solovyova were both dressed in spacesuits and taken to the launch pad by bus. After completing her communication and life support checks, she was sealed inside the Vostok.
After a flawless two-hour countdown, Vostok 6 launched faultlessly, and Tereshkova became the first woman to fly into space. Her call sign in this flight was Chaika, later commemorated as the name of an asteroid, 1671 Chaika.
After her flight, she studied at the Zhukovsky Air Force Academy and graduated with distinction as a cosmonaut engineer in 1969. The same year, the female cosmonaut group was dissolved. In 1977 she earned a doctorate in engineering. Due to her prominence she was chosen for several political positions: from 1966 to 1974 she was a member of the Supreme Soviet of the Soviet Union, from 1974 to 1989 a member of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet, and from 1969 to 1991 she was in the Central Committee of the Communist Party. In 1997 she was retired from the air force and the cosmonaut corps by presidential order.
Valentina Tereshkova later became a prominent member of the Soviet government and a well known representative abroad. She was made a member of the World Peace Council in 1966, a member of the Yaroslavl Soviet in 1967, a member of the Supreme Soviet of the Soviet Union in 1966–1970 and 1970–1974, and was elected to the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet in 1974.
She was also the Soviet representative to the UN Conference for the International Women’s Year in Mexico City in 1975. She attained the rank of deputy to the Supreme Soviet, membership of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union Central Committee, Vice President of the International Woman’s Democratic Federation and President of the Soviet-Algerian Friendship Society.
She was decorated with the Hero of the Soviet Union medal, the USSR’s highest award.
She was also awarded the Order of Lenin, Order of the October Revolution, numerous other medals, and foreign orders including the Karl Marx Order United Nations Gold Medal of Peace and the Simba International Women’s Movement Award. She was also bestowed a title of the Hero of Socialist Labor of Czechoslovakia, Hero of Labor of Vietnam, and Hero of Mongolia. In 1990 she received an honorary doctorate from the University of Edinburgh. Tereshkova crater on the far side of the Moon was named after her.
After the collapse of the Soviet Union, Tereshkova lost her political office but none of her prestige.
To this day, she is still revered as a Russian hero, and to some her importance in Russian space history is only surpassed by Yuri Gagarin and Alexei Leonov. Since her retirement from politics, she appears infrequently at space-related events, and appears to be content with being out of the limelight.
