magnet for young rocket scientists

Read an article on the airplane about how Elon Musk fulfilled his dream of space exploration. After being spurned by Russians, Elon Musk was determined to build the first-ever spaceship by a commercial company without any government support, a mission-impossible undertaking viewed by many veterans in the space field. To my surprise, during 2008, he went through the wringer that he might cede ownership of Tesla since he even could not afford to pay the employees' salaries for one more day. His perseverance made him ride the adversity out in 2008. Now, both SpaceX and Tesla are extremely profitable. Elon Musk might be the only Silicon Valley whiz-kid that dares to challenge the big incumbents such as Boeing, Martin-Lockheed, GM and Ford.  http://www.bloomberg.com/graphics/2015-elon-musk-spacex/