1844 - First Trans-Atlantic Balloon Flight Confirmed!

posted October 20, 2009 - 12:18pm

1844 - First Trans-Atlantic Balloon Flight Confirmed!

New York Sun, April 13, 1844:

The entire Sun Building was surrounded by hoards of people trying to get a copy of the paper. Big headlines across the front page brought the word of the first Trans-Atlantic balloon flight from England to the east coast of the United States. "The air, as well as the earth and the ocean, has been subdued by science, and will become a common and convenient highway for mankind . . . The Atlantic has been actually crossed in a balloon . . . and in the inconceivably brief period of 75 hours from shore to shore!"

(picture via Guardian.co.uk)

As, noted, by Mr. Edgar Allan Poe, on this very day, his attempts to gain access to a copy of the headlines was fruitless throughout the day because he could not reach the Sun Building because of the enormous thirst by the public to read the headlines.

So, to those folks in Colorado, “you weren't the first to create a full-blown hoax for balloon travel.

In fact, the idea first came to mind and then newspaper headlines 165 years ago.

And, who was behind the Great Balloon Hoax of 1844? None other than Edgar Allan Poe!

Read this entire colorful story as told today by Aida Edemariam

feature writer for the Guardian.co.uk.