Balloons and Airships 1783-1973

{detailed description}It is nearly two hundred years since man first left the ground and travelled through the air in a vehicle of his own design. His aerial carriage was only a frail, paper-covered craft with a burning brazier at its base to provide the hot air that raised it from the ground; but from such humble beginnings stemmed the inspiration that has since carried him out to worlds beyond his own.
After hot air came hydrogen as the lifting medium, and after the free balloon came the airship, which could be powered and steered in flight. In 8o well-chosen examples this volume illustrates two centuries of progress in lighter-than-air flight, from the Montgolfier brothers' original 'cloud in a paper bag' of 1783 to its present-day counterpart flown by sportsmen in many parts of the world.
In between lie the famous, the infamous and the almost unknown: great pioneer names like Lebaudy, Charles and Parseval; the giant Zeppelin airships that operated the world's first airline services in 1910-14 before their military brethren, those 'monsters of the purple twilight', rained terror on London in the First World War; the great Italian polar airships of the 1920S; the balloon bombs launched by Japan against the United States in World War 2; headline-makers like the Hindenburg and R ioi; the unsung but highly successful blimps of the US Navy; and many more.
The illustrations are by Otto Frello and the book is edited by Kenneth Munson, author of the Pocket Encyclopaedia of Aircraft series.
{Author / Publisher / Date}by Lennart Ege
published by Blandford 1973 1st edn. illustrated with 3 view colour drawings, index 12x19
{condition}near fine, inc. d/j.
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