On October 23, a postage stamp dedicated to the 100th Birth Anniversary of Mikhail Reshetnev, an academician, the founder of cosmonautics, was put into postal circulation

Mikhail Reshetnev (1924-1996) was a scientist, a design engineer, one of the founders of the Soviet (Russian) cosmonautics. M. Reshetnev was a Doctor of Technical Sciences, a professor, an Academician of the Academy of Sciences of the USSR and RAS. He is the author of more than 200 scientific papers and inventions. Under his guidance or with his direct participation, approximately 30 types of space complexes and systems were designed and more than a thousand satellites were put into orbit. He made a significant contribution to the development of Russian satellite communications and navigation systems.

Mikhail Reshetnev was born on November 10, 1924, in the village of Barmashovo of the Nikolayev Region. He graduated from the Moscow Aviation Institute with honors. He completed his pre-graduation internship at NII-88 under the supervision of M. Tikhonravov; the subject of his diploma thesis was rocket design. In 1950-1959, he worked in OKB-1 as an engineer, a leading designer, and a deputy chief designer. Since 1959, M. Reshetnev, while being S. Korolev’s Deputy Chief Designer in the OKB-1, simultaneously became the Chief Designer of the enterprise p/b 80 - the Head of the “eastern” branch of the OKB-1 (since October 1961 referred to as OKB-10) in the city of Krasnoyarsk-26 (nowadays, the city of Zheleznogorsk of the Krasnoyarsk Territory).

Under M. Reshetnev's leadership, the Cosmos universal launch vehicle was designed on the basis of combat ballistic missile R-14. In August of 1964, it was used to launch the first satellites of OKB-10 into orbit. In 1967, OKB-10 was renamed the Design Bureau of Applied Mechanics (KB PM), and M. Reshetnev became the General Designer of an independent design bureau, the chief subject matter of which was the development of information satellite systems (for communications, television broadcasting, navigation, and geodesy) for military and civil purposes.

Since 1977, M. Reshetnev was the General Designer and the Director General of NPO Applied Mechanics, which incorporated the Mechanical Plant and the Design Bureau of Applied Mechanics. Since 1967, he lectured at the Krasnoyarsk State Technical Institute, and since 1989, he was a Professor and the Head of the Chair of Mechanics and Control Flows at the Krasnoyarsk State University.

The postage stamp provides a portrait of Mikhail Reshetnev and images of the Luch and SESAT satellites.

In addition to the issue of the postage stamp, JSC Marka produced First Day Covers and special cancels for Moscow, Zheleznogorsk of the Krasnoyarsk Territory, Krasnoyarsk, Penza and Chelyabinsk.


Design Artist: M. Podobed.
Face value: 50 rubles.
Stamp size: 42×30 mm, sheet size: 146×175 mm.
Emission form: a sheet with 15 (3×5) stamps.
Quantity: 90 thousand stamps (6 thousand sheets).

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