February 19, 2022
On this date in 1970, Nikolai Kamanin, head of the Soviet Cosmonaut Corps, writes in his diary that he had another run in with Valentina Tereshkova. Tereshkova was the first woman in space, and Kamanin writes that she corners him after every cosmonaut meeting to ask when another female flight will be scheduled. Although he does not tell Tereshkova, he notes in his diary that he knows this will “never happen”.
This photos shows Soviet cosmonauts at the Kremlin in December 1969. Nikolai Kamanin is shown in the top row, seventh from the left. Valentina Tereshkova is shown in the bottom row, third from the left. Kamanin wrote in his diary of his conversations with Tereshkova only 3 months after this photo was taken. Image credit: RIA Novosti archive, image #612433, Alexander Mokletsov