Modern Balloons and Airships
The History and Legacy of Dirigibles During the 20th Century
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Narrated by:
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David Bernard
About this listen
The Wright Brothers initially underestimated the difficulties involved in flying, and they were apparently surprised by the fact that so many others were working on solving the “problem of human flight” already.
Decades before their own historic plane would end up in the National Air and Space Museum, Wilbur and Orville asked the Smithsonian for reading materials and brushed up on everything, from the works of their contemporaries to Leonardo da Vinci.
Undeterred by the work and the fact that several would-be pioneers died in crashes trying to control gliders, the Wright Brothers tested out gliding at Kitty Hawk in North Carolina for several years, working to perfect pilot control before trying powered flight.
In December 1903, the brothers had done enough scientific work with concepts like lift to help their aeronautical designs, and they had the technical know-how to work with engines. On December 17, the brothers took turns making history’s first successful powered flights. The fourth and final flight lasted nearly a minute and covered nearly 900 feet. The Wright Flyer I had just made history, and minutes later, it would be permanently damaged after wind gusts tipped it over; it would never fly again.
A decade later, aircraft appeared in the skies over the battlefields of World War I, but they did not represent a complete novelty in warfare either, at least not during the early months of World War I. While airplanes had never before appeared above the field of war, other aerial vehicles had already been in use for decades and balloons had carried soldiers above the landscape, for centuries, to provide a high observation point superior to most geological features.
The French used a balloon for this purpose at the Battle of Fleurus in 1794. By the American Civil War, military hydrogen balloons saw frequent use, filled from wagons generating hydrogen from iron filings and sulfuric acid.
The balloonist Thaddeus Lowe persuaded President Abraham Lincoln to use the airships for observation and communication of troop movements to the ground with a telegraph wire. Lowe himself reported, “A hawk hovering above a chicken yard could not have caused more commotion than did my balloons when they appeared before Yorktown.” (Holmes, 2013, 251).
The Confederates agreed with this assessment: “At Yorktown, when almost daily ascensions were made, our camp, batteries, field works and all defenses were plain to the vision of the occupants of the balloons. [T]he balloon ascensions excited us more than all the outpost attacks.”
Indeed, with advances in dirigible technology, many military thinkers and even aeronautical enthusiasts believed that blimps would remain the chief military aerial asset, more or less forever. These men thought airplanes would play a secondary role, at best, and that they might even prove a uselessly expensive gimmick, soon to fade back into obscurity, leaving the majestic bulk of the dirigible as sole master of the skies.
While this obviously did not prove true, dirigibles proved popular in a variety of different ways throughout the 20th century, and they continued to be complements, even as airplane technologies rapidly advanced.
Modern Balloons and Airships: The History and Legacy of Dirigibles During the 20th Century looks at the development of balloons and airships during the 20th century and the innovative ways they were used.
©2019 Charles River Editors (P)2019 Charles River EditorsListeners also enjoyed...
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Story
Every war has its "bridge" - Old North Bridge at Concord, Burnside's Bridge at Antietam, the railway bridge over Burma's River Kwai, the bridge over Germany's Rhine River at Remagen, and the bridges over Korea's Toko Ri. In Vietnam it was the bridge at Thanh Hoa, called Dragon's Jaw. For seven long years hundreds of young US airmen flew sortie after sortie against North Vietnam's formidable and strategically important bridge, dodging a heavy concentration of anti-aircraft fire and enemy MiG planes. Many American airmen were shot down, killed, or captured....
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At some point the political commentary is exhausting
- By Tyler White on 06-07-19
By: Stephen Coonts, and others
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How Carriers Fought
- Carrier Operations in WWII
- By: Lars Celander
- Narrated by: Sean Runnette
- Length: 11 hrs and 23 mins
- Unabridged
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In November 1921, the first purpose-built aircraft carrier was launched by the Japanese, followed a year later by the launch of the British Hermes. The conversion of battle cruisers into aircraft carriers after World War I required the consideration of issues including handling aircraft on the flight deck and the techniques of attacking enemy ships, and the evolution of carrier operations was ongoing when World War II broke out.
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Interesting but not mandatory
- By Thor Olson on 08-29-19
By: Lars Celander
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The Silver Waterfall
- How America Won the War in the Pacific at Midway
- By: Brendan Simms, Steven McGregor
- Narrated by: David DeVries
- Length: 9 hrs and 27 mins
- Unabridged
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The Battle of Midway was, on paper, an improbable victory for the smaller, less experienced American navy and air force, so much so that it was quickly described as “a miracle.” This new history demonstrates that luck, let alone miracles, had little to do with it. In The Silver Waterfall, Brendan Simms and Steven McGregor show how the efforts of America’s peacetime navy combined with creative innovations made by designers and industrialists were largely responsible for the victory.
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Read "The Silver Waterfall"
- By Tiffany Gemas on 06-17-22
By: Brendan Simms, and others
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Harrier 809
- The Epic Story of How a Small Band of Heroes Won Victory in the Air Against Impossible Odds
- By: Rowland White
- Narrated by: Roy McMillan
- Length: 14 hrs and 47 mins
- Unabridged
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April 1982. Argentina invades the Falkland Islands. In response, Britain dispatches a naval Task Force. Eight thousand miles from home, its fate hinges on just 20 Sea Harrier fighters against the 200-strong might of the Argentine Air Force. Combining groundbreaking research with the pace of a thriller, Rowland White reveals the full story of the fleet's knife-edge fight for survival for the first time, and shows how the little jump jet went from airshow novelty to writing its name in aviation legend. And of how a small band of heroes won victory against impossible odds.
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Fast paced thriller
- By J.Brock on 01-28-22
By: Rowland White
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Chasing the Demon
- A Secret History of the Quest for the Sound Barrier, and the Band of American Aces Who Conquered It
- By: Dan Hampton
- Narrated by: John Pruden
- Length: 8 hrs and 39 mins
- Unabridged
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In the aftermath of World War II, the United States accelerated the development of technologies that would give it an advantage over the Soviet Union. Airpower, combined with nuclear weapons, offered a formidable check on Soviet aggression. In 1947, the United States Air Force was established. Meanwhile, scientists and engineers were pioneering a revolutionary new type of aircraft which could do what no other machine had ever done: reach mach 1 - a speed faster than the movement of sound - which pilots called "the demon."
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Not at all what it purports to be
- By John A Stevenson on 11-20-18
By: Dan Hampton
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Merlin
- The Power Behind the Spitfire, Mosquito and Lancaster: The Story of the Engine That Won the Battle of Britain and WWII
- By: Graham Hoyland
- Narrated by: Chris Courtenay, Philip Pope
- Length: 10 hrs and 24 mins
- Unabridged
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The most iconic planes of WWII, the Supermarine Spitfire, Hawker Hurricane, DeHavilland Mosquito and the Avro Lancaster, were all powered by one engine, the Rolls-Royce Merlin. The story of the Merlin is one of British ingenuity at its height, of artistry and problem-solving that resulted in a war-winning design.
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Mostly a history of Rolls Royce
- By Rafael on 09-07-21
By: Graham Hoyland
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Empires of the Sky
- Zeppelins, Airplanes, and Two Men's Epic Duel to Rule the World
- By: Alexander Rose
- Narrated by: Jason Culp
- Length: 22 hrs and 43 mins
- Unabridged
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At the dawn of the 20th century, when human flight was still considered an impossibility, Germany’s Count Ferdinand von Zeppelin vied with the Wright Brothers to build the world’s first successful flying machine. As the Wrights labored to invent the airplane, Zeppelin fathered the remarkable airship, sparking a bitter rivalry between the two types of aircraft and their innovators that would last for decades, in the quest to control one of humanity’s most inspiring achievements. And it was the airship—not the airplane—that led the way.
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Actually, a One-Sided Story
- By JP on 08-03-20
By: Alexander Rose
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Marked for Death
- The First War in the Air
- By: James Hamilton-Paterson
- Narrated by: Gildart Jackson
- Length: 12 hrs and 14 mins
- Unabridged
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Little more than 10 years after the first powered flight, aircraft were pressed into service in World War I. Nearly forgotten in the war's massive overall death toll, some 50,000 aircrew would die in the combatant nations' fledgling air forces. The romance of aviation had a remarkable grip on the public imagination, propaganda focusing on gallant air "aces" who become national heroes. The reality was horribly different. Marked for Death debunks popular myth to explore the brutal truths of wartime aviation.
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Excellent
- By Amazon Customer on 08-20-16
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The Last Zero Fighter
- By: Dan King
- Narrated by: Drew Bott
- Length: 12 hrs and 25 mins
- Unabridged
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Firsthand accounts from interviews conducted in Japan with five WWII Japanese Naval aviators. All are veterans of the pivotal battles of the Pacific War including; USS Panay, Nanking, Pearl Harbor, Wake Island, Rabaul, Port Darwin, Indian Ocean Raid, Ceylon, Midway, Guadalcanal, Marshall Islands, Tarawa, Iwo Jima, Okinawa, the kamikaze in the Philippines, the home defense and the dropping of the atomic bomb. Includes an introduction to the Japanese pilot training system for both officers and enlisted men.
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Fascinating and humanizing story
- By courtney mckean on 07-03-23
By: Dan King
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Lancaster
- The Second World War’s Greatest Bomber
- By: Leo McKinstry
- Narrated by: Peter Noble
- Length: 25 hrs and 32 mins
- Unabridged
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A comprehensive history of Britain's greatest bomber plane. The Spitfire and the Lancaster were the two RAF weapons of victory in the Second World War, but the glamour of the fighter has tended to overshadow the performance of the heavy bomber. Yet without the Lancaster, Britain would never have been able to take the fight to the German homeland. Highlights the scale of the bomber's achievements, including the famous Dambusters attacks. With its vast bomb bay, ease of handling and surprising speed, the mighty Lancaster transformed the effectiveness of the Bomber Command.
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Personal connection to a book section
- By Paul on 01-21-19
By: Leo McKinstry
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Tomcat Fury
- A Combat History of the F-14
- By: Mike Guardia
- Narrated by: Johnny Heller
- Length: 4 hrs and 33 mins
- Unabridged
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For more than three decades, the Grumman F-14 Tomcat was the US Navy’s premier carrier-based, multirole fighter jet. From its harrowing combat missions over Libya to its appearance on the silver screen in movies like Top Gun and Executive Decision, the F-14 has become an icon of American air power. Now, for the first time in a single volume, Tomcat Fury explores the illustrious combat history of the F-14, from the Gulf of Sidra to the Iran-Iraq War to the skies over Afghanistan in the Global War on Terror.
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I read this when it came out, also good as an audio.
- By S. H. Moore on 08-18-20
By: Mike Guardia
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Operation Chastise
- The RAF's Most Brilliant Attack of World War II
- By: Max Hastings
- Narrated by: Max Hastings, Peter Noble
- Length: 11 hrs and 49 mins
- Unabridged
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The attack on Nazi Germany’s dams on May 17, 1943, was one of the most remarkable feats in military history. The absurdly young men of the Royal Air Force’s 617 Squadron set forth in cold blood and darkness, without benefit of electronic aids, to fly lumbering heavy bombers straight and level towards a target at a height above the water less than the length of a bowling alley. Yet this story has never been told in full. Max Hastings takes us back to the May 1943 raid to reveal how the truth of that night is considerably different from the popularized account most people know.
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Wish He Had Stuck to the Core Story
- By John on 06-22-20
By: Max Hastings
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Kangaroo Squadron
- American Courage in the Darkest Days of World War II
- By: Bruce Gamble
- Narrated by: Mark Boyett
- Length: 14 hrs and 20 mins
- Unabridged
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In early 1942, while the American military was still in disarray from the devastating attacks on Pearl Harbor and the Philippines, a single US Army squadron advanced to the far side of the world to face America's new enemy. Based in Australia with inadequate supplies and no ground support, the squadron's pilots and combat crew endured tropical diseases while confronting numerically superior Japanese forces. Yet the outfit, dubbed the Kangaroo Squadron, proved remarkably resilient and successful.
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5 star History!
- By DON COOKE on 03-13-19
By: Bruce Gamble
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Vulcan 607
- By: Rowland White
- Narrated by: Roy McMillan
- Length: 13 hrs and 30 mins
- Unabridged
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Shoulder to shoulder with Strategic Air Command B-52s throughout the Cold War, the big delta-winged Vulcans of the Britain's V-bomber force faced down the Soviet threat to the West. In 1982, they were just months from retirement when they flew in anger for the first time. It was to be a record-breaking mission of breathtaking audacity: a single bomber launched from a remote island airbase to carry out what would be the longest-range air attack in history. An 8,000-mile round-trip.
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Wow, incredibly gripping and entertaining
- By MortonC on 09-10-24
By: Rowland White
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Harnessing the Sky
- Frederick "Trap" Trapnell, the U.S. Navy's Aviation Pioneer, 1923-1952
- By: Frederick M. Trapnell Jr., Dana Trapnell Tibbitts
- Narrated by: Patrick Lawlor
- Length: 8 hrs and 51 mins
- Unabridged
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A pilot of calculated courage, "Trap" entered the Navy when test pilots were more like stuntmen than engineers. Airplanes had not yet come into their own as weapons of war, and they had an undeveloped role in the fleet. His vision and leadership shaped the evolution of naval aviation through its formative years and beyond. When the threat of war in 1940 raised an alarm over the Navy's deficiency in aircraft - especially fighters - Trap was appointed to lead the Flight Test Section to direct the development of all-new Navy airplanes.
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Superb Book
- By Peter H. Christensen on 09-27-19
By: Frederick M. Trapnell Jr., and others
What listeners say about Modern Balloons and Airships
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- MolllyT
- 11-24-20
Better as an ebook
I learned a lot! This short book cover not only the history and progress of hot air balloons and dirigibles both military and civilian, but also tells of current use beyond the colorful races along the Mississippi and in the desert Southwest. I learned that airships are are still used by the military in Afghanistan, but also by NASA for more than weather conditions. Well done!
The narrator was adequate but had no idea how to pronounce Calais or Grumman, among other things.
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