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Yuri Gagarin: life of the week

Yuri Gagarin: life of the week

Asif Siddiqi tells the extraordinary story of the first human being to venture into space and orbit planet Earth

Danny Bird

Published: August 11, 2026 at 9:51 AM

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Yuri Gagarin’s journey from a Nazi-occupied Soviet village into outer space make him one of the most famous people on Earth.

In this episode, historian Asif Siddiqi tells Danny Bird about the life behind the legend, revealing how Gagarin came to embody the USSR’s postwar ambitions and why his winning smile still evokes the optimism of humanity’s first steps into the cosmos.

Authors

Danny BirdContent producer

Danny Bird is a content producer at HistoryExtra