Dennis Tito is a millionaire from
California. He was born in
1941 and his parents were
Italian immigrants.
He was inspired by
Sputnik in
1957 and decided to become an
aerospace engineer. He got a job at
NASA's
Jet Propulsion Laboratory in
Pasadena,
California, and for five years in the
1960s, planned the routes of the unmanned
Mariner probes took to
Venus and
Mars.
However, his job at NASA become boring for him and in 1972 he quit and started exploring finance and investment. He was incredibly successful, and become a millionaire by the time he was 40.
He later set up Wilshire Associates, a company that provides investment advice.
Dennis Tito left his footprint in history books when on April 28th, 2001, he became the first space tourist. He basically bought a ticket on a Russian Rocket (the Soyuz TM-32), spent 7 days, 22 hours, and 4 minutes in orbit, and docked aboard the International Space Station.
He purchased his ticket for 20 million dollars (United States). At the time, it was an eighth of the Russian's spending on the ISS.
He caused a bit of controversy because he was paying Russians for tickets to an internationally owned piece of scientific property.