hot air balloons history

THE BALLOON ERA

Rénald FortierCurator, Aviation HistoryCanada Aviation Museum

© Canada Aviation Museum 2004

Each Flight an Adventure.................. 1

The First Ascents............................... 2

Balloonmania....................................13

The Balloon Outside Paris and Beyond France.......................... 21

Bibliography......................................39

Table of contents

i

Each Flight an Adventure

Just over two centuries ago, in 1783, one ofthe first piloted flying machines left theground. This balloon flight had an impactthat is difficult for us to comprehend today.The first flight to the moon — its thirty-fifthanniversary was commemorated in 2004—doubtless comes close; however, significantas it was, the moon flight differs from thefirst balloon flight in that it was carefullyplanned, awaited, and publicized. But in 1783,who could have expected to see people upthere, in the sky? The unexpectednessaccounts for the impact, the shock, that thisflight produced in France and then Europe. Forthe average person, it was utterly amazing.

A bold claim, perhaps, but quite defensible.As evidence, we have the paper on aerialnavigation delivered in 1780 to the Académiedes Sciences de Paris by the celebratedengineer and physicist Charles Augustin de

Coulomb and supported by two illustriousmathematicians, Gaspard Monge and theMarquis de Condorcet, the permanent sec-retary of the Académie des Sciences.Coulomb was categorical when he said “thatno endeavour by man to rise into the air cansucceed, and only fools would attempt it.”

Although no one noted Coulomb’s initial reac-tion to the events of 1783, the number andextent of the accounts that have come down tous reveal the sense of wonder that took hold inFrance, Europe, and even North America.

Canada Aviation Museum · Photo Essays · The Balloon Era

1

Our story begins in the fourteenth century,at the height of the Middle Ages, when thefirst of a long line of Montgolfiers in Francewent into paper manufacturing. The familybusiness, modest at the outset, grew to onewith a reputation that four hundred yearslater extended throughout all of Europe.

In the mid-1770s, the business was run by atalented administrator, Jacques ÉtienneMontgolfier, fifteenth of the sixteen childrenof Pierre Montgolfier. The technical opera-tions were near Annonay in Vivarais, a lushregion about seventy-five kilometres southof Lyon, the second largest city in France.These operations had recently been takenover by Jacques’s brother Joseph Michel,the twelfth child, a skilled technician with akeen mind but who was more intuitive andtimid than his younger brother. Their verydifferences made the two men an uncom-monly successful team.


Our story begins in the fourteenthcentury, at the height of the Middle Ages, when the first of a long line of Montgolfiers in France went into paper manufacturing.

The First AscentsJacques Étienne Montgolfier, ca 1790.

Aérostation, Aviation, p. 13

Joseph Michel Montgolfier, ca 1790.


2

Even today and after much study, no oneknows the details of how the two brotherscame to invent their balloon, or “aerostaticglobe.” The mystery has inspired a numberof anecdotes, including one involving anundergarment belonging to MadameMontgolfier. After washing the elegant arti-cle, she hung it up by its lacing over a smallstove. It filled with hot air and rose to theceiling of the room, where it remained until

Monsieur Montgolfier, called to the rescueby his astonished wife, climbed onto a tableand freed the captive garment. The intriguedMontgolfier then set about conceiving andinventing the hot-air balloon. A charmingstory, to be sure, but entirely untrue.

Nonetheless, after much reading and thinking,the Montgolfier brothers were conducting afew experiments in private as early as 1782.Encouraged by the results, they invited thewhole of Annonay to an official demonstra-tion. This first public balloon flight tookplace Wednesday, 4 June 1783. The balloon,made of panels of cotton packing cloth linedwith paper and buttoned together, rose asexpected, to the exclamations of the crowd.It floated gently back down nine-and-a-halfminutes later after a flight of nearly two-and-a-half kilometres, coming to rest on a low stonewall near a vineyard at Pourrat, in the parish ofDavézieux. There, it was destroyed by sparksfrom its fire. Peasants who witnessed the land-ing were so surprised, or frightened, that theydid nothing to put out the flames.

Members of the Assemblée des États duVivarais who had attended the event quicklywrote an account of the experiment and sentit to the Académie des Sciences de Paris. Thenews caused a stir in the capital’s scientificcircles. Fully aware of the potential significanceof the balloon’s invention, the Montgolfierfamily held a meeting to urge Étienne to go toParis to organize a public flight.

Knowing nothing of this plan, BarthélémyFaujas de Saint-Fond, a volcano specialist atthe Jardin du Roi (today’s Jardin des Plantes)started a fund drive to pay for work to beginimmediately on a balloon. The elite of Pariscontributed. Faujas de Saint-Fond, who was tobecome one of the leading chroniclers of thegreat adventure of ballooning, raised a sizablesum in a few days. Jacques Alexandre CésarCharles, Paris’s most popular lecturer andphysicist and a man full of spirit and enthusi-asm, was to oversee the project.


The first public balloon flight, 4 June 1783.


3

The small team soon encountered a problem.Nothing in the accounts from Annonaymentioned what kind of gas the Montgolfierbrothers had used to fill their balloon.Charles was not particularly concerned. Hedecided to fill his balloon with “inflammableair,” a gas he had used more than once inhis physics presentations. This lighter-than-air gas had been discovered in 1766 by awealthy British chemist and physicist, thebrilliant and eccentric Henry Cavendish. Thegreat French chemist Antoine-Laurent deLavoisier gave the gas its present name,hydrogen, in 1790.

Anne-Jean and Marie-Noël Robert, skilledmanufacturers of physics instruments withwhom Charles had dealt for some time,worked closely with him on this project. Theequipment they developed was the firstcapable of producing a substantial volumeof hydrogen. Their gas balloon quickly drewattention. A huge crowd soon gathered out-side the Robert brothers’ workshops. In theearly morning of Wednesday, 27 August 1783,the balloon, a globe of sturdy, rubberizedsilk taffeta, arrived at the demonstration site,the Champ-de-Mars, not far from where theEiffel Tower now stands.


Jacques Alexandre César Charles, ca 1785.

La Navigation aérienne; Histoire documentaire

et anecdotique, p. 44

The small team soon encountered a problem. Nothing in

the accounts from Annonay mentioned what kind of gas

the Montgolfier brothers had usedto fill their balloon.

4

Barthélémy Faujas de Saint-Fond, ca 1790.

La Navigation aérienne; Histoire

documentaire et anecdotique, p. 35

The first spectators began to appear in theearly afternoon. People were everywhere inthe area, lining both banks of the Seine andeven the road to Versailles. Only ticket hold-ers were allowed into the temporaryenclosure around the balloon. The crowdwas huge and rather impatient, and cries ofdiscontent were soon heard. Finally, atabout five in the afternoon, the balloon wasreleased from its moorings and rose into thesky at a dizzying rate.

The crowd was stunned. Overcome withemotion and enthusiasm, many spectatorsembraced each other, while others burstinto tears. All eyes were fixed on the samepoint in the sky. Even a fierce downpourcould not break the spell. Imagine, a flyingmachine made by human hands was travel-ling through the skies!

But the story does not end there. The bal-loon had been fully inflated before itsascent, and the pressure of the hydrogenagainst its walls increased as the balloongained altitude. The upper part of the enve-lope finally gave way, allowing much of thegas to escape. Forty-five minutes after leaving the Champ-de-Mars, the balloon fellinto the midst of a group of peasants fromthe village of Gonesse (about twenty kilome-tres north of Paris).

The peasants were stricken with terror, theirfirst thought being that some foul-smellingmonster had fallen on them. Confused, thenfurious, the group attacked, and in just a fewminutes the balloon’s envelope had beentorn to shreds. The remnants were tied tothe tail of a horse and dragged across thefield to the village. As a result of this attack,


5

Filling up the first balloon designed by Charles

and the Robert brothers, August 1783.



the government published a public noticestating that balloons were perfectly harm-less. The notice was distributed throughoutFrance in the latter months of 1783.

In the meantime, Étienne Montgolfier hadbeen busy at work. A committee of theAcadémie des Sciences de Paris had prom-ised to underwrite the cost of making aballoon, leaving him free of financial worry.Given the scope of the project, the ministry offinance was quick to assume control of thefinancing for the venture. Shortly thereafter,the general comptroller introduced Montgolfierto the upper echelons of the Court.

A demonstration was organized before theroyal family at Versailles. King Louis XVI, whowas very interested in things mechanical andtechnical, gave his consent to a flight thatwould take place 19 September 1783. Thechoice of date was no accident. It was to bean opportunity for the many diplomats whohad come to Versailles to sign the peace

treaty between England and its formerAmerican colonies to admire this latest prod-uct of French ingenuity.

A first balloon, made in the workshops of thefamous French wallpaper manufacturerJean-Baptiste Réveillon, a longtime friend ofÉtienne Montgolfier, was destroyed by rainduring ground tests on 12 September.Pressed for time, Montgolfier, Réveillon, andseveral friends worked day and night to con-struct another balloon of varnished taffeta.They completed the envelope, which waspainted blue and ornamented in gold withthe intertwined initials of King Louis XVI andclassical symbols of Apollo, on the morningof 18 September.

The next day, Friday, 19 September 1783, themagnificent balloon arrived at the greatcourtyard of the Château de Versailles. It wasset up on a huge wooden dais covered withcanvas made especially for the occasion. Forthis flight, Montgolfier and his friends decided


6

The landing of the first hydrogen balloon,

at Gonesse, 27 August 1783. La Navigation

aérienne; Histoire documentaire et

anecdotique, p. 37

to take a great leap forward—the balloonwould carry the very first aeronauts: a sheep,a duck, and a rooster.

By ten that morning, the road from Paris toVersailles was jammed with carriages and withpeople arriving on foot. The crowd swarmedover the great courtyard, the Place d’Armes,and the surrounding avenues. Some evenclimbed onto the rooftops. The king himself

descended with his family to the dais, whereMontgolfier answered their many questions.

The process of inflating the envelope beganat about one in the afternoon, and then thingsstarted happening quickly. The balloon tookshape, the lines holding it were cut, and itimmediately rose, lifting skyward the wickercage containing the three animals. Theastounded crowd roared.

Shortly after lifting off from the dais, the bal-loon was caught by a gust of wind. Theaerostat listed far to one side, allowingsome of the hot air to escape. This, coupledwith a tear, shortened the flight to just tenminutes. The machine landed three kilome-tres from Versailles, in the Vaucressonwood, its passengers safe and sound.Reports that the sheep, on the verge ofpanic, had broken the rooster’s right wing,


7

The first flight of a hot-air balloon in Paris,

19 September 1783. La Navigation aérienne;

Histoire documentaire et anecdotique, p. 39

appear to have been unfounded. No oneknows exactly what became of the threeillustrious travellers. Some say they werekilled so that an autopsy could be per-formed. Others believe the sheep lived outits days in the royal menagerie.

Whatever the case, among the first to reachthe landing site was the director and founderof a Paris museum devoted to popular sci-ence. Patronized by the king’s brother, theComte de Provence, and his wife, the muse-um was the first establishment to havereceived the approval of the king’s council.This young physicist, bold, charming, ambi-tious, and among the most prominent menin Paris, was Jean-François Pilâtre de Rozier.

Delighted by what he had seen, Pilâtre de Rozierwanted the privilege of being the first human tofly in a balloon. His wish came true. On 15, 17,

and 19 October 1783, he took part in a series ofcaptive test flights. Although the lack of public-ity allowed the team to work undisturbed onWednesday, 15 October, such was not the caseon 17 October. A huge crowd gathered at theRéveillon workshops. The assembling throngsoon made all of the neighbouring streetsimpassable. Two days later, the balloon reachedan altitude of nearly 100 metres, where it couldbe seen by all of Paris.

Thus, in the eyes of the public, Pilâtre deRozier was the first man to fly. However,closer investigation indicates that ÉtienneMontgolfier had made at least one captiveballoon flight before mid-October. His elder-ly father then became concerned andordered him not to do it again.

For several of his flights Pilâtre de Rozier wasnot alone. During the fourth and final flight on19 October, for example, he was accompa-nied by François Laurent, the Marquisd’Arlandes, who was not only an infantry

major but also a regular visitor at court and afriend of the Duc d’Orléans, a cousin of theking. Thrilled with the results, the two menurged Étienne Montgolfier to undertake apublic flight before Charles and the Robertbrothers, with whom they had a friendly rival-ry, could do so. Montgolfier was reluctant.The idea seemed risky. As well, his fameweighed on him; he was approached wher-ever he went and could no longer go abouthis business. His brother Joseph dreamedonly of flying, and their paper manufacturingconcern was neglected.

Montgolfier’s indecision did not lift untilNovember. He had to fly. Accepting the offerof the governess of the royal children, thehighly influential Duchesse de Polignac,Montgolfier and his team set up their bal-loon on a wooden dais erected in the park ofthe little Château de La Muette in Passy inthe Bois de Boulogne. The château washome to the court of the king’s son, the two-and-a-half-year-old crown prince Louis. The


François Laurent, Marquis d’Arlandes,

ca 1785. Aérostation, Aviation, p. 26

8

Jean-François Pilâtre de Rozier, ca 1785.



frequent comings and goings and the construction of the dais soon drew attention.The secret, which Montgolfier had wantedto keep as long as possible, was out.

The big demonstration was scheduled for 20 November but was cancelled because ofbad weather. The crowd that had gathered nearthe château was disappointed, but returned thefollowing day, Friday, 21 November 1783.Clouds loomed on the horizon, and the windblew in gusts, but Montgolfier decided torisk an ascent. He took advantage of a calmspell and lit the fire; the envelope inflated.

Jean-François Pilâtre de Rozier and theMarquis d’Arlandes immediately took theirplaces in the circular basketwork galleryaround the lower part of the balloon, stillheld by its lines. A gust of wind pushed theballoon to the ground, and only the quickintervention of a few spectators saved it. Anumber of onlookers began to hurl taunts

and threats, but the gentry reacted quite differently. Several great ladies even helpedrepair the tears in the envelope.

The balloon was ready an hour and a halflater. The wind had died down. Pilâtre deRozier and the Marquis d’Arlandes climbedon board once again. The lines were cut,and the balloon rose. It was 1:55 p.m., a his-toric moment, but the petrified crowd didnot react. In the words of one witness, asolicitor named Thilorier, “Never a deepersilence reigned on earth: admiration, terror,and pity could be read on all faces.”

Disconcerted, the Marquis d’Arlandes salut-ed the crowd and waved his handkerchief.The throng exploded. Cheers burst forth. Itwas at this moment that Benjamin Franklin,scientist, inventor, and the American gov-ernment’s representative in France, utteredan oft-repeated witticism. When someonenearby asked what was the use of the new

invention, Franklin retorted, “What is the useof a newborn child?”

Meanwhile, the balloon was making its wayover Paris. As news of the flight spread,Parisians rushed into the streets and alley-ways to watch. Some curious onlookersclimbed to the tops of the towers of Notre-Dame Cathedral. As the balloon crossed theSeine, its shadow even eclipsed the sun fora few moments. Pilâtre de Rozier andd’Arlandes were carried along by thebreeze, keeping the fire going by stoking itregularly with straw.

Once beyond the walls of the city, the twomen decided to end this first free flight.They still had lots of straw on board butwere concerned about the condition of theenvelope. They landed on the Butte-aux-Cailles, having crossed a distance of tenkilometres. Some of the peasants andlabourers who rushed to the site grabbed


9

A historic moment: the first piloted flight in

history, 21 November 1783.

Le Livre d’Or de la Conquête de l’Air

Pilâtre de Rozier’s topcoat and tore it intopieces for souvenirs or, one might say,relics. The flight had lasted scarcely morethan twenty minutes.

Two days earlier, on 19 November, Anne-Jean and Marie-Noël Robert had announcedthe ascent of a hydrogen balloon in theprestigious Journal de Paris, the only Frenchdaily of the time. They also started a fund

drive, meeting their target in a few days.Better yet, the two brothers asked for andreceived permission to display the balloonthey would use at the Palais des Tuileries,the Paris residence of King Louis XVI, in anarea open to the public. Initially scheduledfor 29 November, the attempt was officiallycancelled by order of the king. Charles, onthe brink of despair, nonetheless decided togo ahead with the preparations and set his

sights on being ready to leave Monday, 1 December 1783.

According to some historians, the crowdthat gathered outside the Palais desTuileries, along both banks of the Seine, andon balconies and rooftops was the largest todate. Half the population of Paris was there,four hundred thousand people in all. Theticket holders stood in the courtyard and


10

Pilâtre de Rozier and the Marquis d’Arlandes

cross over Paris. Aérostation, Aviation, p. 24

gardens of the Tuileries. For this flight,Charles and the Robert brothers had made alarger balloon of rubberized silk panelspainted alternately in yellow and red. Itsblue and gold rococo gondola looked ratherlike a carriage. This magnificent balloon wasthe direct forerunner of all gas balloons con-structed thereafter.

At 1:30 p.m., ignoring the king’s decree,Charles and Marie-Noël Robert took theirplaces in the basket. Charles, in a show ofbravado, opened one of the bottles of cham-pagne stowed on board. The two mentoasted the crowd and emptied their glass-es. Charles then gave the signal, the lineswere released, and the balloon rose. Fromtheir basket, Charles and Robert waved twoflags. Once again, the throng was sostunned that it failed to react.

Only after a few moments did the cheering,applause, and tears begin. The soldiers andofficers drawn up around the compoundsaluted the intrepid passengers. One elderlyspectator, the wife of the Maréchal deVilleroi, could not believe her eyes. With amixture of rapture and regret, she cried,“They will eventually find the secret of eter-nal life. And by then I will be dead.”

Charles and Robert travelled a distance ofsome thirty-five kilometres in just over twohours, coming to rest in the meadow atNesle-la-Vallée. Nearby peasants held ontothe basket to keep the balloon down.Charles, practical as always, immediatelyprepared a brief account and had it signedby witnesses, including the Duc de Chartresand the Duc de Fitz-James, great-grandsonof King James II of England who had died in


The balloon of Charles and Robert lifts off,

1 December 1783. La Navigation aérienne;

Histoire documentaire et anecdotique

11

The Ducs de Chartres and de Fitz-James sign the

brief account of the flight. La Navigation aérienne;

Histoire documentaire et anecdotique, p. 48

Charles decided to return aloft on his own to conduct

a few physics experiments at a higher altitude.

12

exile in France. The two men had followedthe balloon at a gallop from the capital.

This task completed, Charles decided toreturn aloft on his own to conduct a fewphysics experiments at a higher altitude.Robert climbed out, the balloon was againreleased, and Charles rose rapidly to an alti-tude of almost 3 300 metres. Deciding that hehad done enough for one day, Charles landedagain after a solo flight of just over half anhour, in open country near La Tour de Leys,five kilometres from his first landing site.

The details of this double flight caused a stirin Paris. The next day, 2 December, a hugecrowd assembled outside Charles’s homebefore his return. When he arrived, he was

greeted with an ovation. A visit to the Palais-Royal, where Charles thanked the Duc deChartres, ended with another ovation. Thecrowd then carried him aloft in triumph fromthe steps to his carriage. The balloon wasgiven similar treatment; its return to Pariswas greeted with an amazing display ofpublic celebration.

The rewards were not long in coming. TheAcadémie des Sciences de Paris, for exam-ple, awarded the title of supernumeraryassociate to the four aeronauts: Pilâtre deRozier, the Marquis d’Arlandes, Charles, andRobert. Joseph and Étienne Montgolfierbecame corresponding members of theillustrious institution, having been named byacclamation—a first. Their elderly father

received letters patent of nobility, his sonsthus becoming Joseph and Étienne deMontgolfier. Years later, the Air Command ofthe Canadian Forces would adopt the familymotto, “Sic itur ad astra,” meaning roughly,“Such is the pathway to the stars.”

Thus ended the first six months in the historyof ballooning, an exhilarating period duringwhich Paris was the Cape Canaveral of theeighteenth century.


Looking back two centuries, it is difficult toimagine the impact of these first flights in1783. Overnight, a veritable “balloonmania”began to rage in France. This passion, if notmadness, for things of the air grippedeveryone everywhere. Rich and poor,nobleperson and commoner, courtier andcountryperson, all were equally fascinatedby these balloons that soared heavenward.

Balloonmania was manifested in athousand and one ways. It sweptthrough arts and literature, eveneveryday life. One had merely toclaim that an object was “au ballon”(in the balloon style) for sales toincrease. Ceramics are a perfectexample. Often inexpensive, platesand teapots enabled people of allclasses to own a tangible souvenirof the great invention; such ceramicscould be found widely distributedthroughout the countryside, whereit seems to have been more for dis-play than for use.

Rather curiously, these ceramicsand a good many balloon objectsdating from this time had as their motifthe gas balloon, known as the charlière, orthe robertine, aboard which Charles andRobert had made their famous flight of 1 December 1783. Objects depicting thehot-air balloon were much rarer.

Many earthenware factories, for example inStrasbourg, Moustiers, Lyon, Rouen, Lille,Marseille, and especially Nevers, produceda wide and varied range of objects. Therewere bowls and pots decorated with the bal-

loon motif, plates and pitchers, and evenshaving mugs. The captions they bore werenot always very imaginative: “Au revoir,”“Adieu,” and “Bon voyage.” Some, however,were a little more sophisticated, if not outrightbombastic or sarcastic: “Sic itur ad astra,” “Toimmortality,” “The folly of the century,” and“To the folly of the day.”

Quite often earthenware au ballon was pro-duced to commemorate a specific ascent. In

more than one case, the compositions werecopies of engravings of the time, while othersquite simply exploited the fashion of the day,showing just a globe and a gondola and nobackground. For a more affluent public, thefactories of Sèvres, Saint-Cloud, Paris, andLimoges also produced porcelain in the bal-loon style, though in rather smaller quantities.Everything was available, from cups to fullsets of china. These pieces, handpainted ingreat detail, were often magnificent.


Balloonmania

13

Some ceramic plates “au ballon.” Histoire des

ballons et des aéronautes célèbres

Copper cake tins and urns were also designedau ballon, but the theme was not limited totableware. The balloon was a simple subjectto illustrate and took little research. It was easyto design for almost any surface. What morecould one ask?

Many pieces of clothing, especially for therich, had balloon touches. There were beauti-ful dresses with puffed sleeves that were,naturally, au ballon. The fan, light and ofteninexpensive, was a perfect prop favoured byelegant ladies. No one knows just how manywere made showing a balloon. Some, madeof painted or printed silk, were magnificent.Others, more crudely made, were of paper.Very often, if the front bore the picture of anascent, the back tended to be humorous.Indeed, some bore satirical songs. Au ballon

hats were a huge success with the great ladiesof the Court, who also dressed their hair in thislatest style. The epithets for their coiffureswere evocative: “à la montgolfier,” “à laBlanchard,” “au globe volant,” “au demi-bal-lon,” or “à l’air inflammable.”


A fan showing a balloon flown by Jean-Pierre

Blanchard, 1784. Aeronautical Prints &

Drawings, plate 25

A fan depicting three different balloons,

ca 1785. La Navigation aérienne; Histoire


14

This fashion was not the province of womenalone. Gentlemen were also keen. Manywore elegant waistcoats embroidered withballooning scenes. Depicted on their gloveswere scenes of this or that flight. A balloon-hilted sword or globe-knobbed walking stickrounded out their toilette.

In upper-class dining rooms, guests mighttake a liqueur au ballon, such as a crèmeaérienne or crème aérostatique. If so inclined,they could use balloon-style playing cards orplay games of trictrac, a game known inEngland as backgammon, with ivory tokens inthe balloon motif. Later in the evening,dancers who were up on the fashion would doa Gonesse quadrille. Some hosts even servedtheir guests a filet à la Montgolfier.

In the streets, those with the means couldpurchase miniature balloons about twentycentimetres in diameter and inflated withhydrogen. The first toy balloon seems tohave taken to the air 10 September 1783,just two weeks after the first Paris flight ofthe unpiloted hydrogen-filled balloon ofCharles and the Robert brothers. Moreenterprising manufacturers produced minia-ture balloons in the shape of nymphs oranimals. A new industry was born.

The American government representative inFrance, Benjamin Franklin, bought one ofthese small balloons for his grandson andsecretary, William. Some of the nobilitywere so taken with them, they offeredminiature balloons as gifts at their functions.

Unfortunately, a number of people wereinjured following attempts to producehydrogen at home, and the governmentwas forced to ban the practice.

Knick-knacks and trinkets did not escapeballoonmania. Its circular shape made theballoon a popular motif with makers ofpocket watches, doorknobs, and smallboxes of tortoiseshell, ivory, or gold used assnuff boxes and candy dishes (indeed, thereis no better place for candies au ballon);such objects are still highly valued. Evensmall objects seemingly difficult to decoratewere quickly swept along on the wave, suchas the many buttons of burnished steel orthe sets of silverware with gracefulengraved handles that were produced. Even


15

A caricature showing balloon-style clothing,

ca 1785. La Navigation aérienne; Histoire


more luxurious were rings, lockets, andbracelets in the balloon style.

No doubt the most refined expression ofthis craze was glass beadwork embroideryinvolving incredible precision. These mag-nificent miniature scenes, often copies ofperiod engravings, were made using minus-cule beads of coloured glass. In some cases,one square centimetre contained close totwo hundred beads. This beadwork embroi-dery provided wonderful adornment for avariety of luxury items: perfume bottles,small boxes, pocketbooks, writing cases,and hand screens.

As might be expected, furniture and homeaccessories quickly adopted the style of theday. People murmured sweetly to their pet

birds held captive in balloon-style cages.They bought barometers, wall calendars,and even wall clocks in the balloon style.Queen Marie-Antoinette, the wife of KingLouis XVI, ordered such a clock for theChâteau du Petit Trianon, where she spentmuch of her time. The balloon craze alsoextended to furniture, with armchairs, beds,or worktables showing inlaid or carved bal-loons. Round-backed montgolfière chairswere all the rage in the haut-monde.

Nor were the walls of grand residences over-looked. Balloon madness was imprinted onwallpaper and toile de Jouy, printed fabricmade in the Oberkampf factory near Versaillesin the little town of Jouy-en-Josas. Manycraftsmen produced gilt wooden frames auballon, in which they placed mirrors or worksof art, such as paintings or engravings.

These last deserve closer study. The num-ber of engravings, serious and less serious,depicting balloon flight is astounding.Portraits of the principal aeronauts (a wordinvented in 1784), were also numerous. Thebeginnings of ballooning were a literal goldmine for engravers. One print cost the aver-age Parisian a day’s wages, so the ordinaryfolk had to make do with less expensivewoodcuts. Thousands of works have sur-vived until the present, and their numberalone is an indication of the incredible pop-ularity of prints au ballon.

The actual information value all of theseworks should, however, be assessed withsome caution. A number of engravers pro-duced their image of a flight before it hadeven taken place. This ploy, clearly aimed atprofiting as much as possible from the


A caricature pointing out that balloons are

difficult to control. Histoire des ballons et des

aéronautes célèbres

16

impact of a flight, could prove costly andrather embarrassing if the balloon crashedor the flight were cancelled. Such mishapsoften prompted engravers to produce quitevicious satirical works.

So widespread was the craze that book-binders joined in, and not only where worksabout ballooning were concerned.Almanacs were embossed in the balloonstyle. The library of none other than QueenMarie-Antoinette included a magnificentlyornate copy of a type of religious bookknown as a Lecture du Matin.

No doubt poets and chroniclers saw thisconquest of the sky as glittering evidence ofFrance’s great genius. In the view of onepolitician and friend of the philosophers,Chrétien Guillaume de Lamoignon deMalesherbes, the conquest of the sky wasfar more important than victory at sea.France had got the better of England with-out spilling a single drop of blood. Despitethis official rhetoric, the French people’sremarkable gift for not taking themselvestoo seriously survived even balloonmania.

The following anonymous text by an authorwho envisioned an eventual Channel cross-ing is revealing:

If such a reckless venture fails, it may atleast serve to depict the genius of theNation. The exuberant, daring and carefreeFrenchman, giving his imagination free rein,would want to soar at will in the sky, whilethe deeply pensive, thoughtful, methodicalEnglishman would walk gravely on the bot-tom of the sea.

This text might well have inspired the fol-lowing quatrain:

The English, a Nation too proud,Lay claim tothe Empire of the Seas,The French, a Nation lighthearted,Lay hold of that of the Skies.

Interestingly, some believe the author of thistext was English.

This patriotic viewpoint was not the onlyone to inspire poets. The sense of wonderalso inspired many authors who too oftenhad more enthusiasm than talent. The fol-lowing couplet is a patent example:

Cook walks to the ends of the oceans.Montgolfier flies to the heavens;Open the gates of Hell to me, I will put out the fires!

James Cook, an English navigator killed byHawaiians a few years earlier, was knownthroughout Europe for his journeys ofexploration in the Pacific Ocean.

The history of ballooning could almost be toldusing only these works, poems and songs.German author Christian Wieland was sotaken with the wonder and excitement theyexpressed that he coined a new word:“aéropétomanie.” Unfortunately, or perhapsfortunately, this word has passed into oblivion.

As might be expected, the English languagecontains terms still in use today that datefrom that time: “aerostation,” “aerostat,”“aeronaut” and “aerial navigation.” Thosewho favoured the hydrogen balloonbecame known as “charlistes,” while thosewho favoured the hot-air balloon wereknown as “montgolfistes.” When the rivalrybetween these two groups heated up, theycalled each other “gazistes” and “pailleux”(for the gas and straw each used for flight).

The enthusiasm for flight boosted analready considerable interest in science, pri-marily physics. Among the wealthy, sciencewas the passion of the day. Science meantpower. For many philosophers, and forthose who read them, it was through scien-tific knowledge that humanity would finallytame nature. According to some writers, theruling class could even use this knowledge


17

to hold onto its power by showing the mass-es just how ignorant they were.

Science could also raise humanity to thelevel of divinity, or so wrote one JosephVasselier, main correspondent of the writerand philosopher François-Marie Arouet deVoltaire in Lyon and member of theAcadémie des Sciences de Lyon. In a poemthat accompanies an engraving of the flightof the hot-air balloon Flesselles, the largestballoon of its time, Vasselier wrote,

Infinite space separated us from the Heavens;But, thanks to the Montgolfier, inspired by genius, The eagle of Jupiter has lost its Empire,And the weak mortal can draw nearer to the gods.

This balloon, christened the Flesselles bythe wife of the intendant of Lyon, Jacquesde Flesselles, made the third air voyage inhistory on 19 January 1784.

The religious notion of the balloon ascendingto Heaven and then returning the humans tothe Earth lay beneath the reactions of manygroups of peasants seeing the balloon for thefirst time. They believed the aeronauts to besorcerers or angels, or messengers of theLord. They would often tear off the clothing ofthe men who descended from “Heaven” andvenerate the pieces as relics. In one casereported by Jean-Pierre Blanchard, doubtlessthe greatest aeronaut of the time, the smallestbit of food found in the basket was dividedamongst the relic-hunters.

Obviously, the philosophers and scholarssaw things from a more scientific viewpoint.Some thought that science was opening


18

The Flesselles in flight, 19 January 1784.


limitless avenues of progress. Denis Diderot,one of the chief compilers of the famousEncyclopédie, ou Dictionnaire raisonné des sci-ences, des arts et des métiers, said he wasconvinced that one day humankind wouldwalk on the moon. There was no doubt thatmajor technological change was on its way.Was this not true for society as a whole? Forothers, the idea was disquieting. A number ofauthors argued that the balloon was contrary tonature. It allowed humankind to reach a domain,the sky, where it had no business being:

Let us leave to each its domain, God made the skies for the birds;To the fishes, He gave the waters.And to the humans, the Earth.Let us cultivate it, my dear friends.

One evocative example of this idea is anelectrifying event described in a supplementto the Mercure de France, Le Journal poli-tique de Bruxelles. On 19 January 1784, asthe Flesselles was lifting off with Pilâtre deRozier and Joseph Montgolfier, as well asfour young noblemen on board, a youngLyonnaise colleague of Montgolfier’snamed Fontaine jumped into the basketwithout warning. To all these distinguishedpeople the young man said, “On Earth Irespected you, but here we are equals.”

To the ordinary person, the philosophical dis-cussions were of secondary importance. Whatpeople wanted most was to laugh and enjoythemselves. Each flight was a celebration, ifnot a symbol of escape. It was a time with afondness for spectacle. Admission charge ornot, no one could stop the poorest Parisianfrom admiring a balloon in full flight. It is notsurprising, then, that the lighter-than-airmachine made its way into theatre. Severalplaywrights began writing on the theme.One among them, Jean-François Cailhavad’Estendoux, clearly hoped that this ballooncraze would boost his waning career as awriter of comedies.

Recognizing the extent of the public’s passionfor each flight, he reworked several of hisplays. One of them was staged by theComédie Italienne on 19 October 1783, thevery day of the captive balloon flight by Pilâtrede Rozier and the Marquis d’Arlandes. A triumphant success at its premiere in 1770,Le Cabriolet volant, ou Arlequin-Mahomet,drame philosophi-comi-tragi-extravagant enquatre actes et en prose was a flop in 1783.

The story opens in Paris where an inventor,Musco, gives his good friend Arlequin a mar-vellous flying machine, the flying cabriolet ofthe title. Pursued by his creditors, Arlequinflees on board his machine to the eastern king-dom of King Bahaman. On arriving, he learnsthat a prince is preparing to lay siege to atower in which a princess had recently shutherself away so that she would not have tomarry him. Arlequin decides to use hismachine to enter the tower. Passing himself offas the prophet Mohammed, he is worshippedby the besieged. In the final act, Arlequin man-ages to defeat the prince by smashing him onthe head with a cooking pot.

According to the critics, the comic actorCorali, in the leading role of Arlequin, simplydid not measure up to the part. Despiteevery effort, he did not have the talent of thelate Carlin Bertinazzi, the play’s inimitableArlequin of the 1770 production. Moreover,the very basis of Cailhava d’Estendoux’sparody was out of date. Le Cabriolet volantwas originally conceived as a wicked satire— of the maudlin playwrights of the time aswell as of those madmen who wanted to flyin machines that never got off the ground —but by 1783 it had been overtaken by cir-cumstance. Human flight was no longer adream to be mocked; it was a reality.

As early as 1784, several theatrical compa-nies offered the people of Paris entirelynovel plays that detailed the amorous andaerial adventures of fictitious aeronauts.


19

These now-forgotten comedies includedL’Amour physicien, ou l’origine des ballons;Le Ballon, ou la Physico-manie; La Carlo-Robertiade, ou Épître badine des chevaux,ânes et mulets de ce bas monde, au sujetdes ballons; Le Siècle des Ballons; and Leglobe d’amour, ou La nouvelle Didon. In thislast comedy, the playwright describes howthe hero and his female companion becomemasters of an African island thanks to a bal-loon; the arrival of the couple seeminglyfrom the heavens led the islanders tobelieve the pair were gods.

As remarkable as it may seem, balloonma-nia lasted a mere two years. Havingattracted considerable attention when itbegan in 1783, it began to wane in 1785. Theballoon was no longer an inspiration forfashion, art, or decoration. Its rapid declinemay have been owing to the fact that manyflights in the provinces, perhaps up to sixtypercent, ended in failure. In Bordeaux, thecentre of ballooning in France after Paris,barely one-third of balloons managed toleave the ground. It seems the enthusiasmof provincial aeronauts often far exceededtheir abilities.

The failures sometimes caused crowds toturn hostile, and a number of riots brokeout. During one in Bordeaux, two men werekilled. The authorities acted swiftly. Twomen were hanged and seven others sent tothe galleys. It is not surprising that munici-pal, provincial, and royal authorities, whichalready disliked such gatherings as theywere difficult for even the army to control,soon took a dim view of all ballooning ven-tures. In addition to the problems of crowdcontrol was the serious risk of fire. Hot-air

balloons caught fire too easily, and thecities of that time had no real means offighting the blaze.

The city of Lyon issued an ordinance pro-hibiting hot-air balloon flights as of April1784, and on 23 April the Paris police begangrounding any balloon carrying a burner orfireworks. These were the first pieces ofaeronautical legislation. The Paris policealso prohibited anyone without experiencefrom piloting a balloon. Two days later, thecentral government informed the provincesthat an official permit was needed to fly. Notsurprisingly, more and more would-be aero-nauts were denied a licence. The decliningnumber of flights were attended by fewerpeople, who bought fewer products.Balloonmania was coming to an end.

The balloonmania of 1783–85 was uniqueand occurred exclusively in France. It wasnot until the early nineteenth century thatballoonmania spread beyond France’s bor-ders. In the countries of western Europe, thepublic’s passion finally caught up with theaeronauts who by 1800 had been flying fornearly twenty years.


The balloonmania of 1783–85 was unique and occurred

exclusively in France.

20

The Balloon Outside Paris and Beyond France

As might be expected, the flight in Annonayin June 1783 aroused real interest. In lateAugust, the intendant of Lyon, Jacques deFlesselles, managed to persuade JosephMontgolfier to do a free flight there in asmall balloon. Witnesses to this flight wereso delighted that they started up a funddrive to pay for the construction of a largeballoon. In the fall, news of the first pilotedflights reached Lyon. As a result,Montgolfier found himself obliged to makethe balloon larger to accommodate passen-gers. Pilâtre de Rozier, who had hurried tothe site, proposed changes. Deadlines wereextended, the four noblemen to whomMontgolfier had promised places on boardgrew restless, and skeptics became increas-ingly vociferous.

The envelope was assembled in January1784 and was first inflated on a wooden daiserected near the city of Lyon, at the siteknown as Les Brotteaux. Montgolfier’s wor-ries were not over. The balloon was damagedduring another inflation attempt, and then asnowfall soaked the envelope and one sec-tion caught fire during an attempt to dry itout. The local population was annoyed bythese setbacks. On Monday, 19 January1784, it was finally decided to risk an ascent.Spectators and friends of the passengersbecame worried and attempted to have thismadness called off.

The four noble passengers—Prince Charlesd’Aremberg (eldest son of the Prince deLigne) and the Comtes de Laurencin, deDampierre and de la Porte d’Anglefort—would hear nothing of it. They boarded thecircular gallery around the base of the bal-loon, threatening to run through anyone whoattempted to dislodge them. Pilâtre de Roziersuggested drawing the names of three indi-viduals who would then take part in the flight.The four young men stood their ground andordered the lines to be cut. Pilâtre de Rozier,who despite his fears did not wish to be leftbehind, got on board, followed by

Montgolfier. It was then that, seizing theopportunity, Montgolfier’s young colleagueFontaine climbed in after him, becoming thefirst stowaway in aviation history.

Its load far too heavy, the balloon (chris-tened the Flesselles by the intendant’s wife)failed to rise, though Pilâtre de Rozierdumped ballast and three-quarters of thewood intended to fuel the fire. Pushed bythe breeze and still held by two lines, theballoon dropped off the dais and driftedtoward the crowd of nearly 100 000 people.Panic nearly broke out. Finally the lines werecut, and the Flesselles lifted off. The specta-tors gave vent to their joy: hats were flunginto the air; women wept or fainted.

Just minutes later, the envelope tore nearthe top. Pilâtre de Rozier fed as much woodas he could into the burner, but the damagewas too great. The Flesselles plummetedand crashed into the muddy ground near itsstarting point, slightly injuring two passen-gers. The flight had lasted just eighteenminutes. It would be the first and last flightfor Joseph Montgolfier. The crowd’s enthu-siasm was, however, undampened. Thatsame evening, at the Lyon opera house, theaeronauts were recognized and the audi-ence gave them a lengthy ovation. In Paris,a rather vicious and highly popular quatrainmocked their attempt:

You come from Lyon? Tell us plainly:Did the globe depart? Is it certain?– I saw it. – Tell us, did it travel full tilt?– Did it go! ... Oh! Sir, it went flat out!

Certainly not all maiden flights of the erawere as eventful. But one thing is true:Ballooning was in its infancy, and balloonswere not very safe. But the potential risksdid not deter the pioneers.

The balloon also began to gain popularityoutside France. In February 1784, for exam-ple, a hot-air balloon flew close to Milan,

now a major city in northern Italy and thenstill ruled by the Hapsburgs. On board wereChevalier Paulo Andreani and the two brothers, Agostino and Carlo Gerli, who hadmade the craft.

Many women also succumbed to the flyingcraze. Initially, they had to be content withwatching the scenery, as the piloting wasreserved for men. On 20 May 1784, forexample, the Marquise de Montalembertand three other ladies were the first womento take part in a captive flight over Paris onboard a hot-air balloon.

The first woman to make a free flight took tothe air in rather unusual circumstances. Tomark the anniversary of the very first flightat Annonay, a group of merchants in Lyonfinanced the construction of a hot-air balloon,called the Gustave in honour of Sweden’sKing Gustave III who was visiting the regionat the time. A young opera singer, ÉlisabethThible, née Estrieux, managed to persuadeone of the balloon’s designers, the Comtede Laurencin, who had been a passenger onthe Flesselles, to give her his place on board.


21

On 4 June 1784, Thible and the balloon’sother designer, a painter named Fleurant,lifted off from the same site used by theunlucky Flesselles. Thrilled by the experi-ence, the two aeronauts burst into song.They landed after a flight of forty-five minuteson the Belmont rise, about four kilometresfrom their starting point.

Contrary to popular belief, Thible was not amere coquette. Dressed in men’s attire, shewas as energetic as her companion in feed-ing straw into the fire that kept the balloonaloft. Thible was the first woman to fly in afree balloon and the second to be receivedinto the Académie des Sciences de Lyon.

The history of ballooning in North Americabegan soon after the flights by the Montgolfierbrothers and their rivals, Charles and theRobert brothers, were reported in the newspa-pers. A small hot-air balloon of paper, made by

a Quaker physician, Dr John Foulke, took flight10 May 1784 in Philadelphia, the capital of theyoung American republic. Three other balloonsmade brief flights in the days that followed.

Further south, Peter Carnes, a lawyer andtavern owner in Bladensburg, a small townin Maryland, became fascinated with lighter-than-air craft. He made small balloons out ofpaper and silk, and his demonstrations drewhundreds of spectators. Bolstered by thesesuccesses, Carnes announced in TheMaryland Journal of 15 June 1784 that hewould exhibit and fly a hot-air balloon in afield near Baltimore on Thursday, 24 June.

On the appointed day, much of the city’s pop-ulation headed north to the chosen site,Howard Park. In the morning, the silk balloonmade a number of captive flights, but with nopassengers aboard. Carnes seems to haverealized that his excessive weight would pre-


The flight of the Gustave, 4 June 1784. Histoire

des ballons et des aéronautes célèbres

Thible was the first woman to fly in a free balloonand the second to be received into the Académie des Sciences de Lyon.

22

vent the balloon lifting off. If the crowd wasdisappointed, it showed no sign. By allaccounts, the spectators were delighted.

In the afternoon, as the inventor was prepar-ing for a final flight, a thirteen-year-old boyfrom Baltimore, Edward Warren, volun-teered to go up. Taken aback, but thrilled,Carnes allowed him to get in. The young fel-low was carried aloft to the exclamations ofthe crowd. After several minutes, he cameback down. Spectators who had beenimpressed by his courage offered him areward, which he gladly accepted beforeleaving. Thus, scarcely eight months afterthe first captive flight made in France, ahuman being had left the soil of theAmerican continent.

Always thinking of publicity, Carnesdecided to attempt a free flight from thelarge yard of the Philadelphia prison,using the same balloon with a fewminor changes. This site would allowfor crowd control and ensure that onlyticket holders could attend the liftoff.The flight, set for the 4 July nationalholiday, had to be postponed. On 19 July, during takeoff, a gust of windthrust the balloon into a wall, andCarnes was tossed to the ground. Freeof his weight, the balloon quickly roseto a great height, and then burst intoflames and crashed. Despite denials,many spectators firmly believed theaeronaut had perished. The inventor,shaken but unhurt, decided against asecond attempt.

British North America, far less settled, wasuntouched by the fever for flight until the1830s, and it was 1840 before an aeronautmade the first piloted flight. On 10 August1840, an American aeronaut born inGuadeloupe, Louis Anselm Lauriat, lifted offfrom Saint John, New Brunswick. At agefifty-four, Lauriat was among the most wide-ly known aeronauts in the northeasternUnited States. His hydrogen balloon, theStar of the East, landed just under thirty-fivekilometres from the city. This was the firstpiloted flight in what would later becomepart of Canada.

In England, opinion was divided over bal-looning. The Royal Society of Londonfeigned indifference, but in fact manyresearchers were extremely disappointed tosee France conquer the sky before lablanche Albion. The eighteenth-centurywriter Horace Walpole considered the bal-loon a mere toy, the same as a kite.Similarly, some newspapers, such as TheMorning Herald of 27 December 1783,urged “all men to laugh this new folly out ofpractice as soon as possible.”

This mixed reaction of disappointment andpique largely explains why foreigners werethe first to take to the air in England. On 4November 1783, without any prior publicity,Count Francesco Zambeccari, an Italiansailor and adventurer, sent a small hydrogenballoon into the sky with the help of MichaelBiaggini, an artificial flower maker. Threeweeks later, a somewhat larger craft flewfrom the training field of an artillery unit atMoorfields, north of London. A large crowdwitnessed the event. The balloon landed ona farm in Sussex, and the shrewd owner putthe craft on display in his barn and chargeda fee to those interested in seeing it.

In London, a young employee of the embassyof the kingdom of Naples announced hisintention to take to the English skies in a bal-loon. A vain and attractive man of breeding,Vincenzo Lunardi was convinced that such aflight would add to his prestige. Well awarethat he knew little about ballooning, heasked a friend, George Biggin, to back him.The preparations soon led to a number ofproblems. The fund drive for the balloon’s


Count Francesco Zambeccari, ca 1800.


The balloon sent aloft by Count Zambeccari

on 25 November 1783. History of Aeronautics in

Great Britain, facing p. 101

23


24

manufacture got off to a slow start, and inthe middle of the project, on 7 August 1784,Lunardi was denied permission to use theproperty of the Chelsea hospital.

Such caution was understandable. Threedays earlier, on 4 August, the supposedattempt of a French crook calling himself the“Chevalier de Moret” had caused a riot. Withthe failure of a second attempt, this onelegitimate, by a renowned but eccentricanatomist named Dr John Sheldon, all ofLondon was becoming openly cynical. Boththe administration of the Chelsea hospital

and the authorities feared that a further fail-ure would rouse the anger of the spectators,who might become destructive. Lunardi hadto use all his charm to win over the com-mander of an artillery unit who in turn, aftera heated discussion, convinced the authori-ties to lease Lunardi his unit’s traininggrounds at Moorfields.

Lunardi had barely recovered from this set-back when another danger loomed. Theowner of the Lyceum, where his red-and-white silk hydrogen balloon was on display,took possession of it to encourage Lunardi

to pay him a percentage of the funds raisedfor the venture. The aeronaut eventually had tocall in the police to effect the return of his prop-erty. The balloon reached Moorfields underguard in the afternoon of 14 September;Lunardi was exhausted.

The next morning, 15 September 1784, thesun shone brightly. A crowd of nearly 150 000people gathered around the enclosure guard-ed by soldiers. A series of incidents kept thetension high. By 1:30 p.m., the balloon wasonly half-inflated and the skeptical crowd grewrestless. It would take little to spark a riot.

A vain and attractive man ofbreeding, Vincenzo Lunardi was

convinced that such a flight wouldadd to his prestige.

Vincenzo Lunardi, ca 1785.


Biggin and Lunardi held a war council anddecided that Lunardi would fly solo.

Lunardi boarded just before 2 p.m. with adog and a cat. The lines were untied, andthe balloon rose. One of the two oarsLunardi intended to use to control his flightdropped to the ground. Following the exam-ple of the Prince of Wales, members ofParliament who had come to witness theliftoff (William Pitt and Edmund Burkeamong them) doffed their hats, fearing thatthey would never see poor Lunardi again.

The aeronaut, however, had little concernfor what was going on below. Ecstatic withthe flight, he had a bit to eat and drink andallowed the balloon to drift. After a while,Lunardi began to row with the remainingoar, with little success. He touched down at3:30 p.m. in South Mimms, where he dumped


Vincenzo Lunardi’s balloon a few moments

after liftoff, 15 September 1784. History of

Aeronautics in Great Britain, facing p. 122

25

A close-up of Lunardi’s balloon.

Aeronautical Prints & Drawings, plate 38

The aeronaut, however, had littleconcern for what was going onbelow. Ecstatic with the flight, hehad a bit to eat and drink andallowed the balloon to drift.

the cat and the rest of his ballast. Lunardirose back into the air almost immediatelyand resumed rowing. At 3:55 p.m. hetouched down a second time, at a farm nearWare, in Hertfordshire.

A nearby group of men fled in panic whenLunardi asked them for help, but a woman by

the name of Elizabeth Brett, fascinated by thesight, went immediately to his aid. The men,feeling sheepish, turned back and went to lenda hand, and Lunardi was able to climb out ofthe basket. He had covered a total distance ofnearly forty kilometres, completing the first airvoyage in the British Isles and the first air voy-age of any great distance.

Overnight, Lunardi became the darling ofLondon. The newspapers trumpeted hisname. Songs extolled his courage. Hugecrowds went to see his balloon on display atthe Pantheon. Encouraged by his first flight,Lunardi repeated the experience on 13 May1785. On 29 June his backer, George Biggin,flew with the first female English aeronaut,


26

Lunardi’s second flight, 13 May 1785. History

of Aeronautics in Great Britain, facing p. 125

Letitia Anne Sage. Also in 1785, Lunardi flewat Liverpool, Edinburgh, and Glasgow.

On 23 August 1786, in Newcastle-upon-Tyne,Lunardi’s balloon escaped from the groundcrew, taking with it a young man named RalphHeron whose arm had become caught in theanchor rope. He fell as the horrified crowdlooked on and died from his injuries a few

minutes later. Lunardi was forced to flee themenacing crowd. His name ruined, he leftEngland soon after. Though deeply affected bythe young man’s death, Lunardi continued tofly in the Italian peninsula and then in Spainand Portugal, where he again found the adula-tion he so enjoyed. In about 1792, after a flightin Spain, peasants thought he must be a saintfrom Heaven and hoisted him onto their

shoulders in triumph. Even so, Lunardi diedpoor and forgotten in a convent near Lisbon,Portugal, in 1806.

Noting the passion of the crowds, a numberof individuals soon realized that ballooningcould prove profitable. The first profession-al aeronauts started to appear. Lunardi wasamong this early group of great barnstormers.


Below,

George Biggin and the first English female

aeronaut, Letitia Anne Sage, 29 June 1785. History of

Aeronautics in Great Britain, facing p. 126

Left,

Lunardi lifting off from Madrid, Spain, in 1792.

Aeronautical Prints & Drawings, plate 63

27

The very first, a brave Frenchman, Jean-Pierre Blanchard, was without a doubt themost famous and most gifted. He alsoadopted as his motto “Sic itur ad astra.”

Blanchard first lifted off 2 March 1784 onboard a balloon fitted with flapping vanes.The departure itself was not withoutmishap. An excited young man to whomBlanchard had refused a place on boarddrew his sword. He slashed the ropes anddamaged one of the balloon’s oars. Contraryto the story that circulated for some years,the fellow was not the young NapoleonBonaparte. Upset by such slander, Napoleonattempted to set things straight in his mem-oirs. The guilty party was in fact a chum ofhis from the École militaire de Brienne,named Dupont de Chambon.


Jean-Pierre Blanchard, ca 1790.

La Navigation aérienne; Histoire documentaire et

anecdotique, p. 65

28

Dupont de Chambon assaulting Blanchard’s

balloon. La Navigation aérienne; Histoire


Blanchard, his hand slightly injured, had toleave behind his passenger, a monk namedPesch. The monk was especially disappointedas he was there in defiance of a formalinstruction from his order forbidding travelon this invention of the Devil that was erod-ing people’s belief in miracles. Moreover,the good brother had just escaped from aprison where he had been held by the headsof his order. His disobedience was to costhim dearly; his order banished him to itsremotest monastery.

In any event, once the damage had beenrepaired, Blanchard lifted off from the Champ-de-Mars in Paris. As planned, he attempted torow northeast, to La Villette, but the heedlesswind carried him in the opposite direction, toBillancourt. Just the same, the aeronautclaimed he had been able to control his flight.All of Paris had a good chuckle at his expense.The following quatrain was highly popular:

From the Champ-de-Mars he flew;In a nearby field he landed;A lot of money he accrued.Gentlemen, sic itur ad astra.

Having neither the financial means nor theconnections of Charles and the Montgolfierbrothers, Blanchard soon learned to gener-ate his own publicity. Instead of flying inFrance, where he was just one of manyaeronauts, Blanchard decided to seek hisfortune where there was less competition.The French aeronaut arrived in London inAugust 1784 and quickly became the focusof a group of ballooning enthusiasts thatincluded two physicians— John Sheldon,the would-be aeronaut, and John Jeffries, awealthy American with Loyalist tendencies.

Blanchard and Sheldon lifted off from the yardof a military academy in Chelsea, London, on16 October 1784, scarcely a month afterLunardi’s historic flight. As the flight’s solebacker, Sheldon had insisted on taking alongseveral of his scientific instruments. However,when the balloon was unable to clear the sur-rounding obstacles, Blanchard grew impatientand flung everything over the side, to theprotests of Sheldon. During the flight, theaeronaut attempted to steer the craft by means


One of Blanchard’s passengers, Dr John Sheldon,

1784. History of Aeronautics in Great Britain,

facing p. 166

29

Blanchard lifting off, 2 March 1784.


of a pair of flapping vanes and a windmill thatlooked like an Archimedes’ screw. Neithermethod proved effective. Sheldon descend-ed at Sunbury, and Blanchard returned aloftalone. He made a second landing in Romsey,more than 115 kilometres from London.

It was with his other backer, Dr JohnJeffries, that the French aeronaut made hissecond flight in England, on 30 November1784. Once again, a cargo of scientific

equipment meant that the balloon wasunable to clear the surrounding trees andbuildings. This time, though, Jeffries wasable to control Blanchard, and all the instru-ments remained on board. The flight lastedtwo hours, and the two men touched downin Kent, near Ingress.

Encouraged by their success, Blanchard andJeffries immediately began dreaming of aneven greater flight: the crossing of the

Channel. Jeffries agreed to pay all of theproject’s costs provided Blanchard did himthe honour of taking him along. The glory-seeking Blanchard tried everything toprevent his patron from accompanying him.Once the balloon and its equipment were atthe departure site, Dover Castle, Blanchardflatly refused to allow Jeffries in the castle.The situation became so tense that the cas-tle governor finally had to intervene.Blanchard even went so far as to line his


30

Dr John Jeffries, 1785.


Encouraged by their success,Blanchard and Jeffries immediately began dreaming of an even greater flight: the crossing of the Channel.

jacket with lead in the hopes that, during theweighing operation, Jeffries would feel thathe had to let the Frenchman leave alone.The ploy was soon discovered.

As remarkable as it may seem, Jeffriesappears not to have been offended by thescheming of the French pilot. Preparationscontinued, and at 1 p.m. on 7 January 1785,the hydrogen balloon, fitted with oars and apropeller and with the two men on board,left the ground and began to make its wayover the white cliffs of Dover. Jeffries wasenchanted by the sight. Unfortunately, theballoon began to lose altitude, and they hadto start dumping ballast.


Two images showing the balloon flown across

the Channel by Blanchard and Dr Jeffries on

7 January 1785. Aeronautical Prints & Drawings,

plate 49

31

Two-thirds of the way across, not a grain ofsand remained on board, so Blanchardordered that all non-essentials be cast over.Ornamentation, the propeller, the oars, theanchors—everything went. The pilot evenremoved his waistcoat and breeches. Hisastonished companion tossed his ownwaistcoat into the air. The lightened balloonrose back up. At 3 p.m., Blanchard andJeffries, numb and delirious with joy, flewover the French coast. At about 3:30 p.m.,they landed near Guînes, in a clearing of theFelmores forest, about twenty kilometresinland. They had conquered the Channel;England was no longer an island.

Blanchard and Jeffries, once found andmore suitably dressed, were taken to Calaisby horse-drawn carriage. They made a tri-umphant entrance. The two aeronauts thentravelled to Paris where King Louis XVI gavehis subject, Blanchard, a pension and a heftyreward. Jeffries had to make do with theunbounded admiration of the great ladiesand gentlemen of Paris.

Though Pilâtre de Rozier congratulated thetwo men, he was deeply disappointed. Hehad been working for weeks on a state-fund-ed project for a crossing of the Channel fromFrance to England (against the prevailing

westerly winds). Quite likely, his interest wasowing largely to the huge reward the Frenchgovernment was offering to the first personto accomplish the feat. Pilâtre de Rozier wassponsored by the Comte de Provence, broth-er of King Louis XVI and a patron of themuseum he had established in Paris.

The aerostat developed by Pilâtre de Rozierwas a strange hybrid that combined aspherical hydrogen balloon with a cylindri-cal hot-air balloon suspended below. Thefirst section of this “aéro-montgolfière,” builtby a chemist and skilled craftsman, Pierre-Ange Romain, was to provide the lift for thewhole craft; the second was to enable thepilot to control its altitude. The combinationwas a novelty, but some, including Charles,considered it dangerous.

On 4 January 1785, barely three days beforethe triumphant crossing of Blanchard andJeffries, Pilâtre de Rozier and Romain set up atWimereux, near Boulogne-sur-Mer. They wereready, but the wind stubbornly blew in thewrong direction. The weeks and monthspassed. Many songs and quatrains openlymade fun of the setbacks of the two aeronauts.The press became increasingly nasty. Pilâtre deRozier made the best of the long delay to trav-el to Paris and London. Finally, in June, thewind co-operated; it was now or never.

On 15 June 1785, Pilâtre de Rozier andRomain filled the top portion of their aero-stat with hydrogen. They then lit the burnerof the lower part. When the two sections ofthe vehicle had been attached together, thetwo men climbed aboard the circulargallery. The aéro-montgolfière took off justafter seven in the morning and rose rapidly.


The aéro-montgolfière flown by Pilâtre de Rozier

and Romain. La Navigation aérienne; Histoire


32

The wind, at first favourable, soon pushedthem back toward France.

About twelve minutes after takeoff, thespectators, among them Pilâtre de Rozier’sfiancée, a young Englishwoman namedSusan Dyer, saw the burner of the hot-airballoon drop a little. Then a flame shot fromthe top of the hydrogen balloon. Horrifiedand helpless, the onlookers watched as the

craft plunged. There was a terrible crash,and Pilâtre de Rozier was killed on impact.

His glory, alas! was but a dreamWhose end proved with splendour That the moment that lifts us upwardIs followed by the one that brings our ruin.

Romain died in the arms of the first arrivalson the scene of the disaster. Dyer, overcome

with grief, died shortly afterward. The con-quest of the sky, which almost miraculouslyhad thus far been without serious injury, hadjust claimed two victims.

Touched as he was by the death of his rival,Blanchard continued to fly, becoming thefirst aeronaut to tour several regions ofEurope. In 1785, for example, the Frenchaeronaut made flights from Frankfurt am


33

History’s first aerial disaster.


Main, a free city of the Holy Roman Empire;from the Hague, in the United Provinces; andfrom Ghent, in the Austrian Netherlands.

In August 1785, Blanchard and a companionand journalist, the Chevalier de l’Espinard,lifted off at Lille and travelled a distance ofnearly 500 kilometres. That year, Blanchardcould boast of being the most famous andexperienced aeronaut in the world. Jean-

Baptiste Guillaume Curtius, a predecessor ofthe renowned Madame Tussaud, added theaeronaut to the gallery of wax personageson display at Paris fairs.

In 1788, Blanchard stunned crowds in Basel, amajor city in the Swiss Confederation, when,to lighten his underinflated balloon, he simplyuntied the basket and headed skyward dan-gling from four ropes. The next year, the

French aeronaut went to Warsaw, Poland, andto Prague, Bohemia, a territory underHapsburg rule. The French Revolution beganwhile Blanchard was still in these regions. TheAustrian authorities, convinced he wasengaged in revolutionary propaganda, placedhim behind bars in Kufstein, Tyrol. Blanchardsoon managed to escape and decided to tryhis luck on the other side of the Atlantic.


34

A flight made in Nuremberg by Blanchard in

November 1787. Aeronautical Prints & Drawings,

plate 62

Not long after arriving in North America,Blanchard announced in a Philadelphianewspaper the first public flight in NorthAmerica in nine years. Tickets went on salefor two and five dollars. On the appointedday, Wednesday, 9 January 1793, a fair-sizedthrong gathered at the chosen site, the yardof the city prison. Among the few privilegedspectators who could afford the price of aticket were George Washington and fourfuture presidents of the United States: JohnAdams, Thomas Jefferson, James Madison,and James Monroe. Blanchard, sharplydressed as usual, wore a beautiful blue suit

that nicely matched the blue of the basket.At 10:10 a.m. he lifted off. His hydrogen bal-loon travelled about twenty-five kilometresin forty-five minutes.

When he landed in New Jersey, Blanchardshowed his laissez-passer signed byWashington. But the farmer he happened toencounter was illiterate and became suspi-cious. Not knowing what to do, Blanchard,who spoke no English, uncorked a bottle ofwine. The farmer smiled. Successful as it hadbeen, this maiden flight in America did notbegin to pay for itself. Blanchard was only too

familiar with this problem. Pursued by badluck and constantly short of funds, he left theUnited States in 1797.

Back in Europe, Blanchard continued to fly, butfinancial success still eluded him. In 1808,while in full flight, he suffered a heart attack.His long career as an aeronaut was well andtruly over. Blanchard died in Paris in March1809, at the dawn of a new era in ballooning.

After 1810, the occupation of pilot becamesomewhat more profitable. There was evenmore to be made if the pilot was a woman.


The first parachute jump, made

by Garnerin on 22 October 1797.


André Jacques Garnerin and his wife,

Jeanne Labrosse, ca 1797. Aeronautical Prints &

Drawings, plate 73

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The first professional female pilot—and thefirst female parachutist—appears to havebeen a Frenchwoman, Jeanne Labrosse, apupil and the future wife of André JacquesGarnerin.

This man, the first person to attempt a para-chute drop from a free balloon, accomplishedthe feat in Paris on 22 October 1797.

Eventually very popular in France, Garnerin suf-fered the wrath of Napoleon Bonapartefollowing an unpiloted flight he had organizedon 16 December 1804 to commemorate thecrowning of the French emperor by Pope PiusVII. By an almost incredible chance, the balloonarrived in Rome the next morning and grazed StPeter’s cathedral. Part of a gilded crownattached below the envelope fell on the tomb ofthe Roman emperor Nero, a half-mad despot.Superstitious, like many authoritarian heads ofstate, Napoleon was not amused by this strangeaffair. Poor Garnerin soon fell into disfavour.


The balloon launched on 16 December 1804

to celebrate Napoleon’s coronation.



Superstitious, like many authoritarian heads of state,

Napoleon was not amused by thisstrange affair. Poor Garnerin soon

fell into disfavour.

36

Another person who continued to benefitfrom the public’s interest in ballooning wasBlanchard’s wife, Madeleine-Sophie. Theunusual couple is credited with the first hon-eymoon voyage in a balloon. A slender andrather timid woman on firm ground,Madeleine-Sophie Blanchard showed invin-cible courage in a balloon. In April 1810, shetook to the air to celebrate the marriage ofthe French emperor Napoleon I to Marie-Louise of Hapsburg. Forgetting her imperialloyalty, Madame Blanchard flew four yearslater during celebrations marking the returnof the monarchy, in the person of King LouisXVIII, formerly the Comte de Provence andpatron of Pilâtre de Rozier.


Madeleine-Sophie Blanchard, ca 1810.



The flight Mrs. Blanchard made when

Louis XVIII entered Paris, May 1814.



The flight made by Madame Blanchard

to celebrate Napoleon’s wedding, April 1810.

Histoire des ballons et des aéronautes célèbres

37

Madame Blanchard especially enjoyedevening flights, when the air was calmer.Moreover, the darkened sky considerablyenhanced the effect produced by her greatspecialty, the lighting of fireworks under thebasket. On the evening of 7 July 1819, dur-ing a routine flight in the Jardin Tivoli, afavourite leisure spot of Parisians, a hydro-gen fire broke out. Thinking it was an addeddimension of the show, the onlookers burstinto applause. They soon realized their mis-take. As they watched in horror, the balloonfell onto a rooftop.

Madeleine-Sophie Blanchard’s death didnot diminish the public’s interest in, if notpassion for, balloons and aeronauts. On thecontrary, ballooning, utilitarian or otherwise,increasingly became a part of daily life.


The 7 July 1819 tragedy in Paris.


On the contrary, ballooning, utilitarian or otherwise, increasingly became a part of daily life.

38


Bibliography

A. Books

Romance of Ballooning: The Story of the Early Aeronauts. London: Patrick Stephens with Édita Lausanne, 1971.

Cadogan, Mary. Women with Wings: Female Flyers in Fact and Fiction. London: Macmillan, 1992.

Clément, Pierre-Louis. Montgolfières (Hot-air Balloons). Paris: Tardy, 1982.

Crouch, Tom D. The Eagle Aloft: Two Centuries of the Balloon in America. Washington: SmithsonianInstitution Press, 1983.

Ege, Lennart. Balloons and Airships. World Aircraft in Color. New York: Macmillan Publishing Co., 1974.

Fontaine, Raymond. La Manche en Ballon : Blanchard contre Pilâtre de Rozier. Dunkerque: Éditions du Beffroi, 1983.

Gardiner, Leslie. Man in the Clouds: The Story of Vincenzo Lunardi. Edinburgh: W. & R. Chambers, 1963.

Gillipsie, Charles Coulston. The Montgolfier Brothers and the Invention of Aviation, 1783-1784. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1983.

Glines, C. V., ed. Lighter than Air Flight. Watts Aerospace Library. New York: Franklin Watts, 1965.

Goldstein, Laurence. The Flying Machine and Modern Literature. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1986.

Jackson, Donald Dale, and the editors of Time-Life Books. The Aeronauts. Epic of Flight. Alexandria: Time-Life Books, 1981.

Lomax, Judy. Women of the Air. New York: Dodd, Mead & Company, 1987.

Marck, Bernard. Les aviatrices : Des pionnières aux cosmonautes. Paris: Éditions de l'Archipel, 1993.

Reynaud, Marie-Hélène. Les frères Montgolfier et leurs étonnantes machines. Vals-les-Bains: Éditions de Plein Vent, 1982.

Rolt, L. T. C. The Aeronauts: A History of Ballooning, 1783-1903. London: Longmans, Green and Co., 1966.

B. Exhibit Catalogues

The Balloon: A Bicentennial Exhibition. Minneapolis, Minnesota: University Art Museum, University of Minnesota, 1983.

La part du rêve : De la montgolfière au satellite. Paris: Association des Amis du Musée de l'Air et de l'Espace, 1983.

Le Temps des ballons : Art et Histoire. Paris: Éditions de La Martinière, 1994.

Degardin, Alain. The Balloon Age. Paris: Éditions de La Martinière, 1995.

C. Articles

Boselli, Élisabeth. "Élisabeth Thible : La première femme volante." Icare 124 (1er trimestre 1988): 112-115.

Dollfus, Charles. "Céramiques et ballons." Pégase 11 (octobre 1978): 5-8.

Salmon, Larry. "Ballooning: Accessories after the Fact." Dress 2 (1976): 1-9.

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