Boris Yevseyevich Chertok (14 March 1912 – 14 December 2011) was a Russian engineer in the former Soviet space program, mainly working in control systems, and later found employment in Roscosmos. Major responsibility under his guidance was primarily based on computerized control system of the Russian missiles and rocketry system, and authored the four-volume book Rockets and People– the definitive source of information about the history of the Soviet space program. From 1974, he was the deputy chief designer of the Korolev design bureau, the space aircraft designer bureau which he started working for in 1946. He retired in 1992.

Personal life

Born in Łódź (modern Poland), his family moved to Moscow when he was aged 3. Starting from 1930, he worked as an electrician in a metropolitan suburb. Since 1934, he was already designing military aircraft in Bolkhovitinov design bureau. In 1946, he entered the rocket-pioneering NII-88 as a head of control systems department, working along with Sergei Korolev, whose deputy he became after OKB-1 spun off from the NII-88 in 1956. He was married to Yekaterina Semyonovna Golubkina. He was an atheist.

Rockets and People

Between 1994 and 1999 Boris Chertok, with support from his wife Yekaterina Golubkina, created the four-volume book series about the history of the Soviet space industry. The series was originally published in Russian, in 1999.

Translation into English

NASA's History Division published four translated and somewhat edited volumes of the series between 2005 and 2011. The series editor was Asif Siddiqi, the author of Challenge to Apollo: The Soviet Union and the Space Race, 1945-1974. Chertok dedicated this series to his wife.

Honours and awards

Literature