Sputnik
Sputnik was the first artificial earth satellite with four external radio antennae to broadcast radio pulses. The Soviet Union launched it into an elliptical low Earth orbit on 4 October 1957. They were all invented by the Russians AKA Soviet Union but there is more than one sputnik the fist one took place in Russia, soviet union1957. nothing could prevent the launching of this sputnik because it was passed by the federal government using the National Defense Education Act. Our reaction towards the sputnik was that we finally managed to launch a satellite of our own, so the following year we began to devote considerably more resources to the Space Race and the military uses of space were not yet restricted by treaty, Earth orbit represented the ultimate access to an enemy's homeland. This might have included reconnaissance or something as threatening as an orbital bombing platform for nuclear weapons in space. The US was extremely worried and anxious because they thought that the Soviet Union could drop an atomic bomb on us, The United States. The result to the sputnik was that created a massive shock to all Americans and a race to catch up in the advancements of space programming. Americans were set on beating the Soviet Union, so they tried to catch up as well as surpass the Soviet's technological advances leading up to the first man on the moon.