Mark this date, June 21, 2004: Space travel is now a private industry.

MOJAVE, CALIFORNIA – The first non-governmental rocket ship flew to the edge of space today and was piloted to a safe landing on a desert airport runway here.

Civilian test pilot, now turned astronaut Mike Melvill brought SpaceShipOne down to the Mojave Airport tarmac after flying to 100 kilometers (62 miles) in altitude, leaving the Earth’s atmosphere during his history-making sub-orbital space ride.

It reminds me of Tom Swift and his Rocket Ship, which, as far as I can remember, was the first science fiction book I ever read. It chronicles Tom’s participation in a contest to build and fly the first privately-built craft to orbit the earth (similar to today’s X-Prize). Interestingly, it was first published exactly 50 years ago this month.