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as the new one is to be. It was [print cut off] 1790 pounds. It will have a capacity of 78,000 cubic feet of gas and the netting over the bag will weigh 286 pounds. The diameter will be 56 feet, while the car will be 6 feet long, 5 feet wide and 4 1/2 feet high. While the balloon is indented chiefly for signal work, it will be large enough to carry deadly bombs in case of need. Inquirer, Philadelphia 18 Mar. 1907. FLOCK OF BALLOONS Interesting Flight to Be Made From Inquirer Building at Noon Tomorrow One of the very biggest of aeronautic affairs will take place tomorrow, when five hundred vari-colored balloons will be liberated from the second floor of The Inquirer building, 1109 Market street. The affair will take place at noon, and wind-sailing experts are expected to be on hand in thousands to witness the interesting sight. Further than the beauty of the ascension there will be an added element of attractiveness in the fact that attached to each balloon will be something worthwhile. Two hundred and fifty of them will carry one month's free subscription to The Philadelphia Inquirer, while the remaining 250 will have attached to them free seats for "Little Johnny Jones," the celebrated George M. Cohan musical comedy, which opens a three weeks' engagement at the Part Theatre commencing tomorrow night. Inquirer Philadelphia March 1907. CORNERING THE AIR? Vision of Meters for the St. Louis Aero Club. [From the St. Louis Globe-Democrat.] Heretofore the "air merchant" has been a figure of speech, but he will presently be a stern reality. All he needs to do is to prove his claim and take possession of his allotment of the circumambient. From Holland comes the news of a court decision which gives the owner of land property rights in the air above it, and construes as "trespass" any invasion of said air by any flying machine or balloon, and a New York justice has decided that a telegraph or telephone line may not pass above the property of any land owner without his consent. We cite these instances from the immediate consideration of the Aero Club of St. Louis, and for the more remote consideration of all our people. We must not go to the expense of building airships until we have secured permission to navigate the air. Nor is ownership of air any more illogical than ownership of land. The one is no more essential to the sustenance of human life than the other. Only we are accustomed to the private ownership of land, and pay ground rent as a matter of course while it would come as something of a shock to us to be required to pay air rent. This brings up visions of air meters placed in our throats to register the cubic fee of air we inhale. We indignantly aver when we pay ground rent that, it is supposed to conclude the right to the use of the air, but this only proves that we really admit the right to property in air. It is evident that if we may not occupy the ground owned by an individual without his permission, we may not use the air above ground. "But the air is not stationary," is objected; "it shifts and changes and can not be confined or fenced. It circulates in the public streets and parks." Assuredly, and the citizen is free to use that in the streets and parks--but you can not live always in these places. You must own your ground and its air, or pay rent for that of others. If we admit the right to private ownership of land, we must admit the right to private ownership of air and water and it follows that we can not use either without the permission of the owner. A source of revenue is here opened up to property owners. They may rent the use of their air to airship sailors, and appeal to an aerial police to enforce payment. This would perhaps cause some embarrassment to our Aero Club, whose guess might feel insulted at being compelled to pay tribute at every subdivision of property, so the members of that body had better seek a franchise from the city council. Armed with the right of eminent domain, they might hold the aeronautical contest in peace, though afterward sued in the courts. If the courts should decide that the air is free, or public property, the,logically, private ownership in land would be threatened. It is going to be a very vexing question and one that will exceedingly fatten the lean purses of the lawyers. Been Bothering Scientific Minds for More than 2,500 Years. Daedalus, descendant of the Erechtheidae, the old Athenian race of kings, a contemporary of Theseus and Minos, was famous as an artist and mechanician, and is celebrated in poetic fiction as flying safely over the Aegean sea by wings which he himself made. According to the same fiction, his son Icarus, flew too near the sun and the wax which cemented his artificial melting, fell and was drowned in the Icarian sea, so named to this day, from his sorrowful misadventure. These are the earliest record in literature of "aviation." Among other early experiments in flight, a wooden pigeon, which sustained itself in the air for a few minutes, is recorded as having been invented by Archytas, of Tarentum, 400 years B.C. Suetonius says that Simon Magus was killed in Rome during the reign of Nero by attempting to fly from one house to another. Friar Roger Bacon (1214-94) constructed a machine consisting of a pair of hollow copper globes, exhausted of air, which could rise in the air supporting a man seated on a chair. In the thirteenth century, Elmerus, a monk, is said to have flown more than a furlong from the top of a tower in Spain. Giovanna Baltsta Damte, a mathematician of Perugia, made several flights above Lake Thrasimene by means of artificial wings attached to the body near the close of the fifteenth century, but discontinued them after an accident to his machine caused a fall which fractured high thigh. In the seventeenth century, Besnier, a locksmith of Saole, France, prudently began to leap from windows one story high [[2nd story in American standards]], and at last ventured safely on flights from elevated positions, passing over houses and over rivers of considerable breadth. The First Balloon. Henry Cavendish, about 1766, discovered the great levity of hydrogen gas -slightly over 14 times less than that of atmospheric gas- and the following year Dr. Black of Edinburgh announced in his lectures that a thin bladder, filled with this gas, must ascend into the air. Cavallo made the requisite experiments in 1782, and found that a bladder was too heavy, paper not air tight, but that soap bubbles filled with hydrogen rose to the ceiling of the room, where they burst. The first successful balloon was made by the Montgolfier brothers, sons of Peter Montgolfier, a paper manufacturer of Annonay, France. It was a parallelopiped or six-sided bag of silk, containing 40 cubic feet. Inflated with hot air from burning paper, it rose to a hight of 36 feet. The Montgolfiers' success with their Montgolfieres or hot-air balloons, led to Charles' experiments with Charlieres, or hydrogen gas balloons. Within a short time several captive ascents, first with animals then by human beings, were successfully made in heated-air balloons, and on Nov. 21, 1873, Pilatre de Rozier and the Marquis d'Arlandes made the first independent aerial expedition, rising 3,000 feet, and descending safely, though not without being exposed to considerable danger, 9,000 feet from their starting point. The Parachute Ten days later, on December 1, Messrs. Charles and Roberts ascended in a hydrogen balloon, fitted with a safety valve, and traveled over thirty-one miles. Over fifty-two balloon ascents are recorded in 1784. Blanchard, the first professional aeronaut, with Dr. John Jeffries of Boston, crossed the English channel from Dover to France in a heated-air balloon January 1, 1785. On June 14, 1785, Pilatre de Rozier with Mr. Romain attempted to cross from the French side in a combination hydrogen and heated-air balloon, but the machine caught fire 3,000 feet in the air and both men were killed. The disaster was caused through unfortunate negligence, and the cause of aeronautics did not suffer. The parachute, already known through Beshier the "flying man's" successful flights, was first utilized in a descent from a balloon by Garnerin, October 22, 1797. Ballooning, or the "lighter than air" means of aerial navigation, now found more advocated than "aviation," or the "heavier than air" method. Before this, Bishop Wilkins hal also attracted considerable attention by his theories and experiments in "aviation," and at the end of the eighteenth and the beginning of the nineteenth century, Sir George Cayley was the chief exponent of "aviation." Notable Ascensions Following the early experiments of the latter part of the eighteenth century, among notable balloon ascensions during the nineteenth century, taken in the interests of science, were those of Messrs. Reobertson and Lhoest in 1803-04, of Gay-Lussac and Biot in 1804, of Carlo Brischi and Andreani in 1806, of Green, the English aeronaut with Messrs. Holland and Mason in 1836, of Bixio and Barral in 1850, of Messrs. Glaisher and Coxwell in 1862, when they reached a hight of seven miles, and of Messrs. Camille Flammarion, W. de Fonvieville and Gaston Tissandier, 1867-69. In July, 1859, John Wise, the American aeronaut with John La Mountain and two others, made a remarkable journed from St. Louis, Mo., to Henderson, in Jefferson County, N. Y., a distance of 1,150 miles, in 19 hours and 50 minutes, or at an average speed of nearly a mile a minute. Since the beginning of the twentieth century this record has been exceeded only by Count de la Vaulx's flight of 1,200 miles from Paris to Russia. During the wars of the French revolution, an aerostatic institution was established in [[Meuldon]], near Paris, in [[year]]. For training a [[?]] of [["newstiers"]] to observe the enemy by means of balloons. Since then regular balloon corps have been attached to many armies, and in their interests numerous attempts have been made to construct dirigible balloons. The "aeronautic fish" on which Marshal Ney is said to have spent $20,000, occupied the attention of s- the most ingenious and scient- in France for a considerabl[e] It was a large balloon, of a l- like figure, intended to swim in -- like a fish in water, and to be -- by wings or fins working by -- But when launched, though it -- and moved forward a little, it -- on one side and this tendency could not be corrected, so that the experiment was proved a failure. In 1853, a European aeronautical society was formed; and in 1843 an Aerial Transit company obtained the assent of the British house of commons to a bill for its constitution to exploit a steam-propelled aeroplane-aviatior invened by Mr. Henson. During the Franco-Prussian war balloons were used extensively, and the [[Ullans?]] had many a hard ride pursuing them. At Ladysmith the British used a captive balloon, all through the siege, with much benefit to the intelligence department. It was announced recently that the United States government has ordered three balloons, worth $12,000, and will shortly establish an aerial station at Fort Omaha, Neb. Dirigible Balloons Gaston and Albert Tissandier achieved some success in 1884 with [a] dirigible balloon, but the first notable dirigible flight was that of Col. Renard, on April 9, 1884, when, in a cigar-shaped balloon, with a powerful motor and a front screw, he left Chalais-Meudon, and returned to his starting point in twenty-three minutes after describing and oblong course of five miles. Since then aerial navigation has developed along the lines [of] dirigible balloons and motor [aeroplanes]. Notable successes in dirigib- have been achieved since [] by Santos-Dumont, Count [] of Paris, Conut Almerigo [] the American professional aeronauts Leo Stevens and Roy Knabenshue, but although perfect control has been attained in a wind varying from nine to eleven miles an hour, bulk, fragility, structural weakness, -ableness, and the inability to carry [hea]vy loads have to be overcome before practical value is insured. One of Santos-Dumont's most notable flights took place October 19, 1901 when, starting from the Aero Club park near Longchamps, he sailed around the Eiffel Tower and returned to his starting point, having covered over eight miles in twenty-nine minutes and thirty seconds. By this feat, accomplished within half a minute of specified time, he won the Deutsch prize of $20,000. Besides Santos-Dumont's various dirigible balloons, "La Patrie," built for the French government by M. Lebaudy, made a successful flight of more than eighty miles in 1906, and another powerful airship is the dirigible balloon designed by Louis Godard for the Wellman polar expedition in 1907.
