Short answers, pulled from the story.
Yuri Gagarin became the first human to orbit Earth on the 12th of April 1961 aboard Vostok 1. This flight marked the beginning of human spaceflight and ignited a geopolitical firestorm between Washington and Moscow.
Alan Shepard flew as the first American in space on the 5th of May 1961 aboard Freedom 7. Unlike Yuri Gagarin, Shepard manually controlled his spacecraft's attitude during his suborbital flight.
Medical data dating back to the 1970s show that astronauts can lose up to twenty percent of their muscle mass on spaceflights lasting five to eleven days. Male astronauts may experience severe eyesight problems after long space flight missions and spaceflight may harm brains and accelerate Alzheimer's disease onset.
Blue Origin has carried out thirty-one launches as of May 2025 including eleven crewed flights. The first crewed flight by Blue Origin carried founder Jeff Bezos and his brother Mark Bezos on the 20th of July 2021.
More than 600 people have flown in space but only 75 have been women. Citizens from 38 nations including space tourists have flown in space aboard Soviet, American, Russian, and Chinese spacecraft.