Tamayo Méndez was The First Black Man in Space

IF YOU GOOGLE “the first Black person in space” the immediate results will point you to NASA astronaut Guion Stewart Bluford Jr. In 1983, onboard the space shuttle Challenger, he voyaged to the cosmos.

But while Bluford was the first African American to fly to space.

The honor of the first Black person to go actually belongs to Cuban cosmonaut Arnaldo Tamayo Méndez, who flew to orbit onboard a Soviet Soyuz 41-years-ago on September 18, 1980.

He is also the first Latin American and first Cuban to go to space.

Tamayo Mendez is Cuba's first and only cosmonaut.