The following is a timeline of important events in the history of private spaceflight, including important technical as well as legislative and political advances. Though the industry has its origins in the early 1960s, soon after the beginning of the Space Age, private companies did not begin conducting launches into space until the 1980s, and it was not until the 21st century that multiple companies began privately developing and operating launch vehicles and spacecraft in earnest.
The Inspiration4 mission may be the first time a spaceflight crew is comprised entirely of civilians – nongovernment astronauts. There has been a long history of ordinary citizens going to space. In fact, that was NASA's goal at the beginning of the space shuttle era – to fly regular people on a routine basis
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{{cite web}}
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