How did the space race begin?

Answer 1

There are a few alternate viewpoints on exactly how and when the Space Race began, but the most accepted view is that it began on October 4, 1957, when the Soviet Union launched Sputnik 1, the world's first artificial satellite, into Earth orbit. This led to a rapid sequence of events in both the United States and the Soviet Union that helped mobilise the industrial resources of both superpowers towards the goal of 'beating' the other in space technology.

If you look a little further back in time, however, one could argue that the Space Race began in the years after World War Two with the ballistic missile programs of the United States and the Soviet Union. Ballistic missiles (in particular ICBM's, or Inter-Continental Ballistic Missiles), are an example of what is known as dual-use technology, in that whilst they are designed primarily for a military purpose (i.e. delivery system for nuclear weapons across continents), they also have the power to launch satellites into space. After Nazi Germany's technological leap in the development of the V2 ballistic missile during World War Two (with a range of around 300 kilometres), the United States and the Soviet Union both clamored to gather as much information as they could about this technology in the post-war confusion of occupied Germany. The Americans were undoubtedly far more successful in this venture, due to the repatriation of a number of German rocket scientists and their blueprints to the US under a project informally named "Operation Paperclip". This included Wernher von Braun, the father of the Nazi rocketry program and inventor of the V2. With much less to go off, the Soviet Union launched its own indigenous program to develop a V2 replica from scratch - this was accomplished by a man named Sergei Korolev. Both nations then continued to build upon their rocket technology over the next decade - ostensibly from a military viewpoint, but with certain individuals such as von Braun and Korolev harbouring desires for space exploration.

1957 was a key year in that it fell during the "International Geophysical Year" - a period of time dedicated to, among other things, aeronautical and upper atmospherical research. The United States had publicly declared it's intention to launch the world's first satellite during this period; following suit, the Soviet Union decided more privately on a similar project. The original design for the Sputnik satellite was far more complicated, however due to time constraints and the desire to beat the Americans into space, it was replaced with the simpler model.

The American reaponse is commonly known as the "Sputnik Crisis", and led to, among other things, the creation of NASA (the National Aeronautical and Space Administration) as a central, civilian, unified effort for the American space program.