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But was PS-1 really in orbit? Had the little orb survived the violent shaking and vibrations of takeoff? Had it overheated during its ascent, succumbing to the friction of slamming through the dense lower atmosphere at nearly 25,000 feet per second? Had the thin cover shields held? Everyone rushed to the communications van parked outside to find out. The van sprouted an array of antennae tuned to the two frequencies of PS-l’s twin transmitters. Inside the van, both operators hunched over their dials, cupping their headphones. “Quiet,” one of them yelled. “Be quiet.” So many people were pressing against the vehicle, clamoring for information, that the two operators couldn’t hear anything. Then, one of them raised an exultant arm. “We have the signal,” he shouted. “We have it.”

Celebration erupted: dancing, laughing, hugging. Grown men cried and kissed one another. Glushko and Korolev embraced, their clashes momentarily forgotten. “This is music no one has ever heard before,” the Chief Designer cheered. Even the rigid military engineers inside the control bunker rose out of their seats in a rare display of emotion, though Chekunov, the young lieutenant who had pressed the launch button, would later recall that none of them would truly understand what had just happened until much later.

Reports now started trickling in from the Far Eastern tracking stations. One after another, they were acquiring PS-l’s signal. It was on course, and its orbit seemed to be holding steady. Only a relatively minor altitude loss of fifty miles was reported. Once more cheering and shouting erupted, because that meant that the early engine cutoff had not had disastrous consequences after all. Already some of the State Commission members were reaching for the phones, ready to call Moscow with the good news. Korolev, though, was surprisingly subdued and silent. “Hold off on the celebrations,” he finally counseled. “It could still be a mistake. Let’s wait to hear if we can pick up the signal after a complete orbit.”

For an hour and a half they waited, smoking, pacing, and fidgeting. When the appointed time for PS-1 to reappear over Soviet territory came and went in silence, a deathly stillness descended on the anxious crowd assembled in the huge hangar. A sense of foreboding suddenly gripped the scientists. Maybe PS-1 had continued to lose altitude and had burned up in the atmosphere. Maybe they had failed after all.

At a few minutes after midnight, one of the westernmost tracking stations in the Crimea picked up something. At first faintly and with static, and then louder and clearer: BEEP, BEEP, BEEP.

Amid the pandemonium, Korolev turned to his fellow State Commission members. Now, he said triumphantly, we can call Khrushchev.

8

BY THE LIGHT OF A RED MOON

General Bruce Medaris greeted October 4, 1957, with the giddy anticipation of someone expecting a new lease on life. The day, he felt sure, would mark a turning point for his besieged Army Ballistic Missile Agency—perhaps even offer a reprieve for his own troubled military career.

The source of this uncharacteristic optimism was the scheduled arrival that Friday morning of yet another high-ranking delegation from Washington. This time, though, Defense Secretary Charles Wilson would not be among the visiting brass, quibbling about the guest cottages. Wilson’s reign of terror was over.

Engine Charlie—the man who had sidelined ABMA and tried to put it out of the missile and satellite business, a man so hated in Huntsville that some rocket scientists had once burned his effigy in Courthouse Square—was quitting. Whether Colonel Nickerson’s whistle-blowing scandal and allegations of corporate cronyism had influenced his decision to return to Detroit to devote himself to automotive and charity work, Medaris did not know. Nor did he care. All that mattered was that his nemesis would be out of office by October 8. “We could not shed a single tear over Mr. Wilson’s departure,” Medaris later reminisced. “It was our