“The dawn of private reusable launch vehicles is upon us. SpaceShipOne is a true triumph, when ambition, hard work and amazing technologies have demonstrated to the world that anything is possible,” said Eric Anderson, president and CEO of Space Adventures. “Space Adventures' SPACEFLIGHT CLUB enables private citizens to work toward their own dream of spaceflight. The Club is the answer to many who question, now that SpaceShipOne has flown successfully, how can I be a part of private suborbital flight history?”
(From Space Adventures Unveils Spaceflight Club)

"There is no one among you, my brave colleagues, who has not seen the Moon, or, at least, heard speak of it... It is perhaps reserved for us to become the Columbuses of this unknown world. Only enter into my plans, and second me with all your power, and I will lead you to its conquest, and its name shall be added to those of the thirty-six states which compose this Great Union."

"Three cheers for the Moon!" roared the Gun Club, with one voice.

...It is reserved for the practical genius of Americans to establish a communication with the sidereal world. The means of arriving thither are simple, easy, certain, infallible-- and that is the purpose of my present proposal."

A storm of acclamations greeted these words. There was not a single person in the whole audience who was not overcome, carried away, lifted out of himself by the speaker's words!

"I ask myself whether, supposing sufficient apparatus could be obtained constructed upon the conditions of ascertained resistance, it might not be possible to project a shot up to the moon? ..by incontrovertible calculations I find that a projectile endowed with an initial velocity of 12,000 yards per second, and aimed at the moon, must necessarily reach it. I have the honor, my brave colleagues, to propose a trial of this little experiment."

Nothing can astound an American. In America, all is easy, all is simple; and as for mechanical difficulties, they are overcome before they arise. Between Barbicane's proposition and its realization no true Yankee would have allowed even the semblance of a difficulty to be possible. A thing with them is no sooner said than done.