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I was asked over and over again, "How did it feel?  What was it like to be the first man in America to successfully fly in an airship?"  I believe my feelings were well expressed by the ST. LOUIS DISPATCH, October 26, 1904, when it reported:

"I asked Knabenshue how he liked his first sail through the air.  'Glorious' he said , not ecstatically, but in a hushed way, and in his face was a sort of after glow of the glories of the hour he had spent above the earth:  "I don't supposed I could make anyone feel what I felt when, for a short time, I made that airship obey every touch of my hand, when for a few splendid moments I controlled the upper world.  It seemed like this to me:  Life, motion, everything was untrammeled, without limitation, pathless, all mine :"
This young poet of aeronautics shivered a little bit and turned his coat collar up and pulled his cap down over his eyes as he sat curled up in a chair in the big cold aerodrome."

The ST. LOUIS GLOBE DEMOCRAT reported:

"KNABENSHUE'S PERIL:  and quoted me as saying, "At one  timea gust of contrary wind caught my airship dead in the center and tilted it up to a dangerous degree.  I was forced to leave the four inch plank on which I stood and crawl out on the framework in order to right the craft.  This experience at the height of a mile, was anything buy pleasant:"