Then suddenly...

 

October 4, 1957, the dream detonated on the platform, and the famed liftoff of the R-7 Semyorka took place in the skies over the Soviet Union.

 

Built for Stalin by Korolev, who was released from the Gulag Archipelago to do just that, it was to be used as a ballistic missile rocket. Well, Korolev was a reader of Verne and Tsiolkovsky- and he had an additional plan.

 

Korolev was not part of the same meme as Stalin was. He rode the meme of human progress. And he found that one single moment- when selected individuals are faced with a circumstance that does more than, "change your life", nice as that is, but changes everybody's life.

 

When Stalin died, Korolev's eyes were opened and his mind was clear. He seized that moment and convinced Khrushchev of the "propaganda value" for the Party in the launching of a satellite into orbit.

 

Korolev turned the missile upwards, and because he did, the Age of Aquarius began.