SOVIET USSR RUSSIA VINATAGE MUSEUM RARE SAMOVAR SPUTNIK SPACE SATELLITE SATURN

A samovar in the form of the 1st space artificial satellite Sputnik thee pot on top in form of planet Saturn.
Beautiful  set, a real eye catcher. A Must have collectors item. Seen in the museums.


100% Original Soviet Samovar in the Form of 

"Sputnik 1" ("Спутник-1") Satellite

EXTREMELY RARE PIECE OF SOVIET SPACE MEMORY! NOT PRODUCED ANYMORE!

One of the rarest electro samovars in the world, which is dedicated to Soviet space program, lunching the first artificial Earth satellite "Sputnik 1" in 1957. Designed to heat 2.5 litres of water. The creator of this unique Samovar was Constantin Sobakin. It was made in the Soviet Suksun city in 1978, as written on the samovar itself. Samovar has been produced for a short period of time. Not produced anymore! It is new and never used samovar since 1978. Excellent vintage condition!

Great find for collectors! 

P.S. You can find the same samovar at "The Cosmonauts: Birth of the Space Age" exhibition at the Science Museum in London (see the last photo).


About "Sputnik 1" Satellite

Sputnik 1 was the first artificial Earth satellite. The Soviet Union launched it into an elliptical low Earth orbit on 4 October 1957. It was a 58 cm (23 in) diameter polished metal sphere, with four external radio antennae to broadcast radio pulses. It was visible all around the Earth and its radio pulses were detectable. This surprise success precipitated the American <="Sputnik crisis" style="text-decoration: none; background-image: none;">Sputnik crisis and triggered the Space Race, a part of the larger Cold War. The launch ushered in new political, military, technological, and scientific developments.

Sputnik itself provided scientists with valuable information, even though it was not equipped with scientific instruments. The density of the upper atmosphere could be deduced from its <" title="Aerodynamic drag" style="text-decoration: none; background-image: none;">drag on the orbit, and the propagation of its radio signals gave information about the ionosphere.

Sputnik 1 was launched during the International Geophysical Year from Site No.1/5, at the 5th Tyuratam range, in Kazakh SSR (now at the Baikonur Cosmodrome). The satellite travelled at about 29,000 kilometres per hour (18,000 mph; 8,100 m/s), taking 96.2 minutes to complete each orbit. It transmitted on 20.005 and 40.002 MHz which were monitored by amateur radio operators throughout the world. The signals continued for 21 days until the transmitter batteries ran out on 26 October 1957. Sputnik 1 burned up on 4 January 1958, as it fell from orbit upon reentering Earth's atmosphere, after travelling about 70 million km (43.5 million miles) and spending three months in orbit.


Great condition seen in pictures. Full set


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Soviet Space history:

1. First visionaries of space
The Russian race to space didn’t start from laboratories, but from an intellectual Russian movement of the early 20s. Calling themselves Cosmopolitans, they followed Konstantin Tsiolkovsky‘s pioneering work in rocketry, and set the root for what was to be a thrilled answer to the astonoshing event of the first rocket designed by German scientist Werner von Braun, which entered into space on October 3rd, 1942. In those twenty years, from the theorization of space flight to the actual event, Russian intellectuals did not remain idle: in 1923, the newspaper Izvestiia had published an article on spaceflight theories of Hermann Oberth and Robert Goddard, entitled ‘Is Utopia Really Possible?’, prompting a flourishing of articles, nonfiction books and science fiction novels, such as Alexey N. Tolstoy‘s Aelita. Soon, Cosmopolitans were replaiced by Cosmism, a less universal and more nationalist philosophy developed by Tsiolkovsky himself and Nikolai Fedorov. The idea that Soviets were to be masters of the cosmos started to take roots. Cosmists goals were simple enough: colonizing space, populating the universe with Russians and achieving eternal life by understanding the secrets of time itself. They became an institution and, after requisitioning a shop in Moscow, they set up a shop later known as the World’s First Exhibition of Models of Interplanetary Apparatus, Mechanisms, Instruments, and Historical Materials. The exhibition had a huge impact on popular culture and set the stage for what was to become a national fever upon the succesful launch of Sputnik.

2. Sputnik: the first artificial satellite
On October 1957, Soviet Russia launched its first satellite into space. It was called спутник, Sputnik, and it was a sphere of 58 cm of diameter, built in aluminium. Its shape rapidly entered popular imagination as much as it entered Western fashion, and Soviet premier Nikita Khrushchev elected it to his symbol of a new, progressive, science-driven Russia. Sputnik chandeliers are still named after the satellite.

3. Laika: first dog in space
After the succesful launch of Sputnik, Khrushchev put pressure on the space program and requested three goals to be achieved in the next decade: they had been first in launching a satellite, by beating US’ Explorer 1 launched on January 31st 1958, and they would have been the firsts to launch a living being in orbit, to execute a lunar flybys and to launch a probe to Venus. The first of these races was won by technicality, as NASA launched drosophilae (seriously) but URSS launched dogs. The first dog to enter space was Laika, a month after Sputnik, in what was designed as a one-way trip just to find out if a living being could sustain a launch into space. The dog was given enough supplies to last a week, even if they had no mean to bring her back, but she died a few hours after entering orbit, of overheat. Belka and Strelka followed her three years after, and in 1960 they completed their journey: 18 orbits after which they returned to earth safely, though a little shaken. The dogs became a tremendous force in PR: one of Strelka’s puppies, Pushinka, was given by Nikita Khrushchev to Jacqueline Kennedy in June 1961, as a token of space rivalry, two months after URSS had won the race to send the first ma into space.

4. Yuri Gagarin: first man in space
On April 12th, 1961, the now famous spacecraft which carried the first man in space, the Vostok 1, was carried in orbit on top of an adapted intercontinental ballistic missile, the Semyorka. On board, former Air Force pilot Yuri Gagarin, choosen for the mission from a group of 20 other Russians, mainly for his charisma and working class background. Vostok 1 departed from Baikonur Cosmodrome, currently Kazakhstan, and entered orbit on April 12th, 6.18 a.m., 11 minutes after launch. Gagarin mission lasted 108 minutes and, though his landing was not without incidents, he returned on Earth unharmed. His mission had tremendous impact on PR relationship as he became a cultural ambassador, but by 1962 he had returned to Russian Air Force attaining the rank of Colonel. He died six years later, in 1968, during the crash of a MiG-15UTI jet je was piloting for a routine test. His name is still celebrated, both in Russia and in the former Soviet countries: every April 12th is Cosmonautics Day, and celebrations include a Yuri’s Night with film screenings and parties.

5. Valentina Tereshkova: first woman in space
22 year old Valentina Tereshova was selected after a long round of research and recruitment, began in 1962 by the Soviet Air Force in order to conquer another achievement ahead of the Americans and create a heroine to represent the virtues of the communist system, including gender equality. Tereshova was good-looking, a model worker and from a proletarian background, therefore was chosen in spite of other candidates having slightly better scores, such as Valentina Ponomareva, a pilot and a graduate of the Moscow Aviation Institute. Alongside them, the other reserve was Irina Solovyova, member of the Soviet national parachuting team. By president Sergei Korolev‘s own admission, Tereshova was picked for her outstanding personality and ability to influence a crowd, arousing sympathy. After her succesful journey in Vostok 6, she became a cultural ambassador, travelling in Western Europe and US, while the Female Cosmonaut Detachment was disbanded without any further mission.

6. Alexei Leonov: first man to walk in space
On March 18th, 1965, Alexei Leonov was the very first man to step outside his spacecraft to take a walk in the void of space. Leonov mission came after a row of unsuccessful missions, such as the unmanned Voskhod Cosmos 57 destroyed by its own self-destruct anti-American mechanism, and wasn’t without perils: his spacesuit inflated while in space, human manouvering mistakes were made,  the descent module’s hatch didn’t seal properly, automatic guidance system failed. Still, he and his crewmate Pavel Belyayev returned safely on Earth after a manual descent the craft wasn’t designed to sustain. They landed in Kazakhstan’s Siberia, about 180 km from Perm, where they would have ironically been eaten by bears. Still, they were saved in time by a rescue team on skiis. Voskhod 2 beated US Project Gemini spacewalk by three months. In 1975, US and USSR launched the first joint flight, the Soyuz-Apollo mission, and Alexei Leonov was the commander of the Russian crew. Leonov is currently 81 years old.

7. Game Over: Apollo 11 lands on the moon
With US succesful mission on the Moon, in 1969, the race was over. By the end of the 1970s space travel had lost its novelty and was no longer pushed forward by cold war. Slowly, Russia’s space program declined, as the Country faced other threats.