XCOR Aerospace makes the first manned rocket aircraft delivery of U.S. Mail in Kern County, California.
Rocket mail is the delivery of mail by rocket or missile. The rocket lands by deploying an internal parachute upon arrival. It has been attempted by various organizations in many different countries, with varying levels of success. It has never become widely seen as being a viable option for delivering mail, due to the cost of the schemes and numerous failures.
The collection of philatelic material ("stamps") used for (and depicting) rocket mail is part of a specialist branch of aerophilately known as astrophilately.
XCOR Aerospace was an American private spaceflight and rocket engine development company based at the Mojave Air and Space Port in Mojave, California, Midland International Air and Spaceport in Midland, Texas and the Amsterdam area, the Netherlands. XCOR was formed in 1999 by former members of the Rotary Rocket rocket engine development team, and ceased operations in 2017.
By 2015, XCOR was headed by CEO John "Jay" Gibson, who remained CEO until June 2017.
XCOR Aerospace was the parent operation, concerned with engineering and building spaceships and had two main subdivisions within it; XCOR Space Expeditions provided marketing and sales, and XCOR Science had been set up to conduct scientific and educational payload flights.
By May 2016, XCOR was laying off staff and in 2017, XCOR closed their doors for good and filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy.