In keeping with the theme of friendly skies, which I touched on last week, I’d like to dedicate this column to the intrepid spirit of the earliest aviators, who first demonstrated that earth need not be mankind’s prison, but instead could be a sublime launching pad into the unknown.
And I’d like to contrast those fearless first explorers with the aviation genius who designed the pet-carrier-sized aft lavatory in the Boeing 737.
But first, the sublime.
Not having been schooled in Pennsylvania, I was very surprised to learn that the first manned flight in North America – or South America, for that matter – took place in Philadelphia, in the yard of the then-newly constructed Walnut Street Prison, on January 9th, 1793.
This was, of course, a balloon flight. Powered flight was not to arrive on the scene for another 110 years. But ballooning was already in its late infancy, or perhaps its early toddler phase, having been inaugurated ten years before by the Montgolfier brothers in Paris, France. (I’m talking here about manned and untethered flight. These distinctions are very important in sorting out aviation “firsts.” For instance, in what sounds like the opening of a bad joke, the Montgolfiers had previously launched a balloon with a sheep, a rooster, and a duck, but flights involving farmyard animals apparently have their own record book.)
By 1793, ballooning was not exactly old hat in Europe, but its earning potential as a public attraction was fading. Which is what drew a certain Jean Pierre Blanchard to the New World, ostensibly to share the glories of manned flight with provincial America, but actually to find an audience that might be somewhat easier to pluck.
Blanchard’s hilariously self-serving and pompous account of the Philadelphia flight, entitled, humbly enough, “Journal of My Forty-Fifth Ascension, Being the First Performed in America,” is worth a read. It’s available for download on the Web at http://www.archive.org/details/fortyfifthasc00blanrich. In it, Blanchard graciously deems the American people “worthy” of enjoying the sublime spectacle of manned flight.
Our “worthiness” aside, Blanchard was hoping there’d be plenty of well-heeled Philadelphians willing to pay $5 each – in 1793 dollars!– for a ticket to view his ascent. He was perennially low on cash. The recent French Revolution, and the social unrest that spread across Europe in its wake, may have made him slightly uncomfortable, to boot, given how energetically he’d associated himself with the aristocracy throughout his career.
So he decamped to Philadelphia, with his state-of-the-art ballooning equipment in tow, including plenty of sulphuric acid and iron filings, which he used to produce hydrogen gas. In 1793, Philadelphia was the capital of our fledgling country, which is how it came to pass that George Washington was among the spectators that winter morning. In fact, sensible of the terrifying specter that a dandified Frenchman plummeting from the heavens might pose to simple American farmer, President Washington provided Blanchard with a special passport. The passport is an elegant example of presidential prose, recommending Mr. Blanchard to anyone in the path of his flight, and asking citizens that they “oppose no hindrance or molestation to the said Mr. Blanchard; and that on the contrary they receive and aid him with that humanity and good will which may render honor to their country, and justice to an individual so distinguished by his efforts to establish and advance an art, in order to make it useful to mankind in general.”
At nine minutes past ten that morning, Blanchard, dressed for his flight in bright blue knee breeches, a matching waistcoat, and a white-feathered hat, took leave of President Washington and attached his ballasted car to the balloon, which was straining at its tethers. At the last moment, someone handed him a small black dog, which Blanchard awkwardly accepted, stashing it in the car along with his scientific instruments, a cold lunch, a few bottles of wine, and a mystery gift from two of his friends.
Blanchard’s flight was a success, taking him to an altitude of nearly a mile, and displacing him about 15 miles, where he landed without incident near the town of Woodbury, NJ. During the flight, he found time to run several scientific experiments; to have a snack of a biscuit and a glass of wine; and to unwrap the present, which turned out to be a bottle of ether.
It’s in that happy state, refreshed by wine and a few drops of ether, comforting a shivering little black dog, that we’ll take leave of Monsieur Blanchard, and contrast his aerial voyage with one of my own, made a few weeks ago on a direct descendant of Blanchard’s primitive balloon: the Southwest Airlines commercial jetliner.
Suffice it to say that there was no fanfare on departure; merely an aggressive cattle-drive to find an open seat. No presidential send-off; instead, a draining security shake-down. No cold lunch; instead a packet of suspicious chips that may have been sourced from PetSmart.
No quiet glass of chilled white wine.
No refreshing drops of ether.
And a tiny, humiliating bathroom designed by the Marquis de Sade.
So let us lift a plastic cup of tepid airplane water in a toast to the sublime spectacle of manned flight.
And to the French, who helped make it possible!
This column was published in the Perry Co Times on 01 July 2010
For more information, please contact Mr. Olshan at writing@matthewolshan.com
