Мemory medal. Kerim Aliyevich Kerimov. Federation of cosmonautics. Russia.
Lieutenant-General Kerim Aliyevich Kerimov (Azerbaijani: Kərim Əli oğlu Kərimov, Russian: Керим Алиевич Керимов; 1917–2003) was an Azerbaijani-Soviet/Russian aerospace engineer and a renowned rocket scientist, one of the founders of the Soviet space industry, and for many years a central figure in the Soviet space program. Despite his prominent role, his identity was kept a secret from the public for most of his career. He was one of the lead architects behind the string of Soviet successes that stunned the world from the late 1950s – from the launch of the first satellite, the Sputnik 1 in 1957, and the first human spaceflight, Yuri Gagarin’s 108-minute trip around the globe aboard the Vostok 1 in 1961, to the first fully automated space docking, of Cosmos 186 and Cosmos 188 in 1967, and the first space stations, the Salyut and Mir series from 1971 to 1991.