Falling Upwards: How We Took to the Air Author: | Language: English | ISBN:
B00FX7H46S | Format: EPUB
Falling Upwards: How We Took to the Air Description
Falling Upwards tells the story of the enigmatic group of men and women who first risked their lives to take to the air and so discovered a new dimension of human experience. Why they did it, what their contemporaries thought of them, and how their flights revealed the secrets of our planet in wholly unexpected ways is its subject.
Dramatic sequences move from the early Anglo-French balloon rivalries, the crazy firework flights of beautiful Sophie Blanchard, the revelatory ascents over the great Victorian cities and sprawling industrial towns of Northern Europe, the astonishing long-distance voyages of the American entrepreneur John Wise, and the French photographer F?lix Nadar to theterrifying high-altitude flights of James Glaisher, FRS, who rose above sevenmiles without oxygen, helping to establish the new science of meteorology aswell as the environmental notion - so important to us today - of a "fragile"planet.
Balloons were also used to observe the horrors of modern battle during the American Civil War, including a memorable flight by General Custer.
Readers will discover the many writers and dreamers - from Mary Shelley to Edgar Allan Poe, from Charles Dickens to Jules Verne - who felt the imaginative impact of flight and allowed it to soar in their work. Moreover, through the strange allure of the great balloonists, Holmes offers another of his subtle portraits of human endeavor, recklessness, and vision.
- Audible Audio Edition
- Listening Length: 13 hours and 34 minutes
- Program Type: Audiobook
- Version: Unabridged
- Publisher: Blackstone Audio, Inc.
- Audible.com Release Date: October 29, 2013
- Language: English
- ASIN: B00FX7H46S
When I was a kid, we lived near a golf course, and I can remember seeing the hot air balloons occasionally drifting over our house. At the time, I vowed to one day ride in one myself, something I have yet to do, but the dream was rekindled after reading "Falling Upwards: How We Took To the Air," by Richard Holmes, a history of ballooning that is dramatic, intriguing and beguiling. He begins by describing the harrowing trip of Major John Money, who in 1785 raised money for a hospital, and who came to grief, but returned to ballooning undaunted. The book ends with a detailed account of three "extreme balloonists" who made a perilous polar expedition to the North Pole, of which photos and personal accounts have survived.
According to Holmes, himself a balloonist, balloonists come in all shapes and sizes, but have a few things in common: a passion to be airborne, and resilience in the face of danger. Like passionate equestrians, they tend to get back in the saddle (or basket) fairly soon after an accident.
As for their chosen mode of transport, balloons have been used throughout the ages for far more than simply pleasure flights. Their uses include:
1) Bringing messages to loved ones during war, including during the siege of Paris by the Prussians in the 1870's, as well as during the Civil War.
2) To advertise and generate publicity. Newspapers have solicited accounts from balloonists, and writer Guy Maupassant used a balloon to kick off his book tour.
3) As a symbol of women's rights: Women performers who used balloons to dazzle the crowd were seen as suffragettes.
4) Exploration: Used to study weather conditions and geology among other things.
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