---
title: "Konstantin Tsiolkovsky"
chunk: 4/4
source: "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Konstantin_Tsiolkovsky"
category: "reference"
tags: "science, encyclopedia"
date_saved: "2026-05-05T04:03:32.859220+00:00"
instance: "kb-cron"
---

In 1964, The Monument to the Conquerors of Space was erected to celebrate the achievements of the Soviet people in space exploration. Located in Moscow, the monument is 107 meters (350 feet) tall and covered with titanium cladding. The main part of the monument is a giant obelisk topped by a rocket and resembling in shape the exhaust plume of the rocket. A statue of Konstantin Tsiolkovsky, the precursor of astronautics, is located in front of the obelisk.
The State Museum of the History of Cosmonautics in Kaluga now bears his name. His residence during the final months of his life (also in Kaluga) was converted into a memorial museum a year after his death.
The town Uglegorsk in Amur Oblast was renamed Tsiolkovsky by President of Russia Vladimir Putin in 2015.
The crater Tsiolkovskiy, the most prominent crater on the far side of the Moon, was named after him. Asteroid 1590 Tsiolkovskaja was named after his wife. The Soviet Union obtained naming rights by operating Luna 3, the first space device to successfully transmit images of the side of the Moon not seen from Earth.
The Tsiolkovsky Memorial Apartment. A museum created in Borovsk where he lived and had started his career as a teacher.
There is a statue of Konstantin Tsiolkovsky directly outside the Sir Thomas Brisbane Planetarium in Brisbane, Queensland, Australia.
There is a Google Doodle honoring the famous pioneer.
There is a Tsiolkovsky exhibit on display at the Museum of Jurassic Technology in Los Angeles, California.
There is a 1 ruble 1987 coin commemorating the 130th anniversary of Konstantin Tsiolkovsky's birth.

=== Awards and decorations dedicated to Tsiolkovsky ===
The USSR Academy of Sciences issued the golden table-top Tsiolkovsky Medal "For outstanding work in the field of interplanetary communications". It  was awarded to Sergey Korolev, V.P. Glushko, N.A. Pilyugin, M.V. Keldysh, K.D. Bushuev, Yuri Gagarin, German Titov, A.G. Nikolaev and many other cosmonauts.
The USSR Cosmonautics Federation issued its own Tsiolkovsky Medal
The Russian Federal Space Agency («Федеральное космическое агентство»)  instituted the Tsiolkovsky badge
After the Federal Space Agency  was reformed into the Roscosmos State Corporation for Space Activities, it replaced the Tsiolkovsky badge with the K.E.Tsiolkovsky badge

== In popular culture ==
Tsiolkovsky was consulted for the script to the 1936 Soviet science-fiction film, Kosmicheskiy reys.
The 1968 cult sci-fi film Mars Needs Women concludes with the end credit: " 'Earth is the cradle of humanity, but one cannot live in a cradle forever.' -Konstantin Tsiolkovsky."
SS Tsiolkovsky (NCC-53911) is the name given to a Oberth-class starship on Star Trek: The Next Generation and operated by Starfleet, built at the Baikonur Cosmodrome, in the former Kazakhstan and commissioned on stardate 40291.7.  When the USS Enterprise (NCC-1701D) was threatened by a stellar core fragment, Dr. Crusher's son, Wesley Crusher, used a repulsor beam to push the Enterprise against the Tsiolkovsky, destroying that ship on stardate 41209.3.
The Mars-based space elevators in the Horus Heresy novel Mechanicum by Graham McNeill, set in the Warhammer 40k universe, are called "Tsiolkovsky Towers".

== Works ==

Tsiolkovsky, Konstantin E., “Citizens of the Universe” (1933), (PDF), English.
Tsiolkovsky, Konstantin E., “Creatures of Higher Levels of Development than Humans” (1933), (PDF), English.
Tsiolkovsky, Konstantin E., “Beings of Different Evolutionary Stages of the Universe” (1902),  (PDF), English.
Tsiolkovsky, Konstantin E., “Is There a God?” (1932), (PDF), English.
Tsiolkovsky, Konstantin E., “Are There Spirits?” (1932), (PDF), English.
Tsiolkovsky, Konstantin E., “Planets are Inhabited by Living Creatures” (1933),  (PDF), English.
Tsiolkovsky, Konstantin E., “The Cosmic Philosophy” (1935), (PDF), English.
Tsiolkovsky, Konstantin E., “Conditional Truth” (1933), (PDF), English.
Tsiolkovsky, Konstantin E., “Evaluation of People” (1934),  (PDF), English.
Tsiolkovsky, Konstantin E., “Non-Resistance or Struggle” (1935),  (PDF), English.
Tsiolkovsky, Konstantin E., “Living Beings in the Cosmos” (1895), (PDF), English.
Tsiolkovsky, Konstantin E., “The Animal of Space” (1929),  (PDF), English.
Tsiolkovsky, Konstantin E., “The Will of the Universe” (1928), (PDF), English.
Tsiolkovsky, Konstantin E., “On the Moon (На Луне)” (1893).
Tsiolkovsky, Konstantin E., “The Exploration of Cosmic Space by Means of Reaction Devices (Исследование мировых пространств реактивными приборами)” (1903). (PDF), Russian.
Tsiolkovsky, Konstantin E., “The Exploration of Cosmic Space by Means of Reaction Devices (Исследование мировых пространств реактивными приборами)” (1914). (PDF), Russian.
Tsiolkovsky, Konstantin E., “The Exploration of Cosmic Space by Means of Reaction Devices (Исследование мировых пространств реактивными приборами)” (1926). (PDF), Russian.
Tsiolkovsky, Konstantin E., “The Path to the Stars (Путь к звездам)” (1966), Collection of Science Fiction Works, (PDF), English.
Tsiolkovsky, Konstantin E., “The Call of the Cosmos (Зов Космоса)” (1960), The monograph was first published by the U.S.S.R. Academy of Science Publishing House in 1954 in the second volume of Tsiolkovsky`s Collected Works, (PDF), English.

== See also ==
Cosmonauts Alley, a Russian monument park where Tsiolkovsky is honored
History of the internal combustion engine
Robert Esnault-Pelterie, a Frenchman who independently arrived at Tsiolkovsky's rocket equation
Russian cosmism
Russian philosophy
Soviet space program
Timeline of hydrogen technologies

== Citations ==

== General and cited sources ==
Miller, Ron (1993). The Dream Machines. Krieger Publishing Company. ISBN 0-89464-039-9.

== Further reading ==
Andrews, James T. (2009), Red Cosmos: K.E. Tsiolkovskii, Grandfather of Soviet Rocketry, Texas A&M University Press, ISBN 978-1-60344-168-1 Review
Georgiy Stepanovich Vetrov (1994). S. P. Korolyov and Space: First steps. M. Nauka. ISBN 5-02-000214-3.
Львов, Владимир Евгеньевич (1963). Страницы жизни Циолковского (in Russian). Ленинград: Лениздат. p. 8.

== External links ==

Konstantin Tsiolkovsky. The collection of philosophical works. Biography, books, audiobooks, articles, photographs, video. Russian, English.
“The Theory of Cosmic Eras” The text is an interview between Alexander Leonidovich Chizhevsky and Konstantin Eduardovich Tsiolkovsky, English.
Tsiolkovsky's house The house museum of Tsiolkovsky
Virtual Matchbox Labels Museum – Russian labels – Space – Page 2 – Konstantin Tsiolkovsky Historic images
Tsiolkovsky from Russianspaceweb.com
Spaceflight or Extinction: Konstantin Tsiolkovsky Excerpts from "The Aims of Astronautics", The Call of the Cosmos
The Foundations of the Space Age: The Life and Work of Tsiolkovskiy, by Vladimir V. Lytkin, Tsiolkovskiy Museum, Kaluga.
Tsiolkovski: The Cosmic Scientist and His Cosmic Philosophy by Daniel H. Shubin. ISBN 978-1365259814
The Path to the Stars: Collection of Science Fiction Works
The Call of the Cosmos