History of the Hot Air Balloon
Joseph and Jacques Montgolfier developed their first hot-air balloon in 1783. Joseph and Jacques were 2 of the 16 children of Pierre Montgolfier and his wife. The two brothers worked in the family run business, a paper factory at Annonay, a small town near Lyon in France. Their experiments were inspired by the rising of a shirt that was drying above a fire. They threw scraps of paper in the fireplace, which shortly afterwards could be seen leaving the chimney. From this they mistakenly concluded that smoke, and not hot air, had the power to lift. The density of hot air is less than that of cold air and just as air rises in water (water has a higher density than air), hot air rises in cold air. Despite their mistaken belief, the brothers' experiments led to the invention of the hot-air balloon.
On April 4, 1783, the brothers Montgolfier gave the first public demonstration of the hot-air balloon at Annonay. This unmanned balloon flew a distance of nearly 2 kilometres and reached a height of almost 2 metres. The balloon was made of fabric and was lined with white paper, coated with a layer of alum, which served as a fire resistant layer. The whole balloon was kept together by about 2,000 knots.
Timeline of Ballooning
September 19, 1783 ~ A sheep, a duck, and a rooster become the first passengers in a hot air balloon launched by the Montgolfier brothers, Joseph and Ettienne.
November 21,1783 ~ The first recorded manned flight in a hot air balloon took place in Paris. Built from paper and silk by the Montgolfier brothers, this balloon was piloted on a 22 minute flight by two noblemen from the court of Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette. From the center of Paris they ascended 500 feet above the roof tops before eventually landing miles away in the vineyards. Local farmers were very suspicious of this fiery dragon descending from the sky. The pilots offered champagne to placate them and to celebrate the first human flight, a tradition carried on to this day.
January 19, 1784 ~ In Lyon, France, the only recorded flight by Joseph Montgolfier was made in one of the largest balloons ever made.
September 15, 1784 ~ An Italian, Vincenzo Lunardi, made the first balloon flight outside of France. The 500 cubic metre balloon flew from Moorfields in England and landed near Ware.
November 30, 1784 ~ Launching their balloon from Rhedarium Garden, London, another Frenchman, Jean-Pierre Blanchard, and an American, John Jeffries, make their first flight.
January 7, 1785 ~ the same team of Jean-Pierre Blanchard and John Jeffries became the first to fly across the English Channel.
January 9, 1793 ~ the first flight of a balloon in North America occured in Philadelphia and was piloted by Jean-Pierre Blanchard.
October 10, 1960 ~ the official birth date of the modern hot-air balloon. The first man-carrying free flight took place at Bruning, Nebraska, in the Raven prototype ‘modern’ hot-air balloon. The 30,000 cu ft envelope was constructed of a polyurethane coated nylon and the burner was propane powered.
By 1963, the growing sport was able to sustain the first U.S. national championships.
The balloons used for passenger flights today were developed in the United States during the 1960s and have two main technological advances: using rip-stop nylon, a very safe and reliable material for the envelope and running a LPG gas burner to heat the air in the envelope. Ballooning began as a sport with a few enthusiasts in the USA and England and spread to Australia in the 1970s. Today there are over 5,000 balloon pilots in the U.S. alone.