Konstantin Tsiolkovsky

The first academic paper concerning rocketry was written by this man, and he added conceptually to space travel. Tsiolkovsky was a Russian scientist fascinated by space, but he was also a loner. As a hermit by choice most of his life, his work was largely ignored until after 1920. In 1903, he published The Exploration of Cosmic Space by Means of Reaction Devices which calculated a horizontal escape velocity of 18,000 miles per hour to sustain a minimal orbit around the Earth. He also proposed a way to accomplish this. His idea was a multistage rocket fueled by the reaction of liquid hydrogen and liquid oxygen. Tsiolkovsky also proposed steering boosters, multi-stage boosters, space stations, and airlocks to exit spacecraft. He also proposed the very first idea for a space elevator. While almost no one would know who he is, his work has been invaluable to space travel. He is the first father of rocketry.