on 12 april 1961, gagarin became the first man to travel into space, launching to orbit aboard the "vostok 3ka-3" (vostok 1). his call sign in this flight was kedr (cedar; ). during his flight, gagarin famously whistled the song "the motherland hears, the motherland knows" (). the first two lines of the song are: "the motherland hears, the motherland knows/where her son flies in the sky". this song was written by dmitri shostakovich in 1951 (opus 86), with words by yevgeniy dolmatovsky.