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1960s

No decade saw faster, more dramatic progress in manned space travel than did the 1960s.  The 1957 launch of Sputnik kicked off a Russian-American Space Race that, by the Sixties' onset, was moving at warp speed.  The decade's first half saw the Soviets take a commanding lead with the first man in space, the first woman in space, the first space walk, the first two-manned spacecraft and numerous other breakthroughs.  But America's determination, coupled with technological and engineering advances made possible by the flexibility of the country's open society and free enterprise system, allowed the United States to come from behind and ultimately seize the greatest prize of all:  the Moon.

Plastic model manufacturers on both sides of the Atlantic were more than eager to satisfy the public's hunger for kits of the latest manned spacecraft.  The following collection chronicles the amazing progress of both the American and Soviet manned space programs during this more turbulent and exciting of decades.

Click Photos to Enlarge

R-7 VOSTOK (1961)

-MPC-
1:144

VOSTOK SPACECRAFT (1961)

-VEB PLASTICART-
1:25

MERCURY-REDSTONE (1961)

- ATTIC AIRCRAFT MODELS -
1:48

MERCURY SPACECRAFT (1961)

- REVELL MODELS -
1:48

EXPLORER 18 (1963)

- HAWK MODELS -
1:20

GEMINI ASTRONAUT (1965)

- REVELL MODELS -
1:12

AMERICAN ASTRONAUT  (1966)

- AURORA MODELS -
1:13

SATURN V w/TOWER & CRAWLER (1967)

- CASSHULETTE ENGINEERING -
1:290

SATURN V (1967)

- REVELL MODELS -
1:96

SATURN V (1967)

- AOSHIMA -
1:100

SOYUZ SPACECRAFT (1967)

- OGONYEK -
1:30
 

LUNAR MODULE (1969)

- MONOGRAM MODELS -
1:48

SOVIET LK LANDER (1969)

 -- FANTASTIC PLASTIC MODELS -
1:48

U.S. SPACE MISSILES (1969)

- MONOGRAM MODELS

1:128

   

 

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