ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. — Now that he's been tapped by U.S. President-elect Donald Trump to lead the Department of Government Efficiency, SpaceX founder Elon Musk's plans to make space travel accessible to everyone are receiving more attention.
With this news, some history buffs are looking back on commercial space travel and the history of its notion. That curiosity is leading them to the 1960s, the height of the Space Race between the United States and the Soviet Union.
While NASA sent its astronauts to the moon via the Apollo program, Pan American Airways issued over 93,000 "First Moon Flights" Club cards to space enthusiasts looking to make a reservation for the first commercial flight to the moon.
According to the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum, the cards were issued between 1968 and 1971. The club reportedly originated in 1964 after Gerhard Pistor, an Austrian journalist, went to a Viennese travel agency and requested a flight to the moon.
The agency forwarded the journalist's request to Pan Am, inspiring airline executives to spin it into "a golden marketing opportunity," according to the National Endowment for the Humanities.
The airline reportedly projected that the first commercial flight to the moon would take off by 2000. However, after 1971, NEH said Pan Am stopped taking reservations "due to administrative and financial strain."
“The First Moon Flights Club” was labeled by many as a publicity stunt, but Pan Am representatives maintained well into the 1980s that it was a genuine program, insisting the airline would honor its bookings and that viable commercial space travel was imminent," NEH officials said.
Pan Am would ultimately fail to make good on those promises, as the airline declared bankruptcy in 1991. But since then, NEH said the possibility of space tourism has grown more into a reality, as companies like SpaceX, Blue Origin and Space Perspective "are picking up where the airline left off."
"A single ticket for a six-hour flight costs $125,000, but tourists who are able to afford the hefty price tag can now experience the wonders of space travel firsthand," NEH said.
