We've learned about the Space Exploration of the moon, all the way up to the Apollo 11 moon landing.
We've also sent space crafts up to study other planets.
The first one was in 1962, called the Mariner 2.
It was launched on August 27, and on December 14 it got as close as 22,000 miles from Venus.
(from: wikipedia - mariner 2)
That might not seem very close, but the Earth is about 25,000,000 miles from Venus, so it got a lot closer than we are!
The last time the space craft sent data back to us was on January 3, 1963, then it stopped working and has just been floating in space, orbiting around Venus for over 50 years.
The Mariner 2 was used to try and measure the temperature and collect other information in the air near the planet.
(from: wikipedia - mariner 2)
Kid Facts - Blast from the past: Star Absolute Magnitude
