Don’t Let Your Money Fly Away: A 1909 Warning to Airship Investors

Today , new futurist - seem technologies often attract investors hoping to make stacks of money . And airships of the past were no different . In the first few decennary of the twentieth century the great unwashed scrambled to see out how they might cash in on these exciting new inventions , which were slowly beginning to prove themselves technologically reliable .

But not everyone thought that commercial-grade flight was a good investment . The January 2 , 1909 , issue ofLiterary Digestre - bring out circumstances of a December 10 , 1908 editorial in Engineering News under the newspaper headline , “ A monition to Air - Ship Investors . ” The article spell out out the various path citizenry of the era thought there may be money in flight — transporting freight , rider travel , warfare — but the author rest extremely skeptical that any of those applications would pay off financially anytime shortly .

Literary Digest explains that “ companies to establish , sell , and manoeuver new types of fly - machines will before long be try stock subscription in every city in the country . How shall we distinguish the false from the true ? The advice of the [ Engineering News ] is to keep clear of the whole patronage . ”

From the December 10 , 1908 Engineering News :

So far as the possibilities of consignment fare are worry , it may be passed with a word of honor . Wherever ordinary methods of transportation on land are available , it will be absurd to post trade good of any sort through the melodic phrase . The monetary value of such transportation would be measured not in mills per ton stat mi , as in rail or urine carriage , or cents per ton mile , as in waggon draw , but in one dollar bill or hundreds of dollars per ton .

It is true that for geographic expedition in unmanageable country , as over the Arctic ice or in rough mountain region , there are possible action in the air travel - ship . But such use , of course , is rather scientific than commercial-grade .

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The article continues by pose out the impracticality of rider strain change of location , seeing it as more of an entertainment that might be useful at fairs , rather than as a virtual means of transport . Interestingly , the source also calls out the high-pitched - speed auto as a toy of the rich which permit them to “ vent their excess energies . ”

For the carriage of rider , the necessary risk of infection attendant upon flight through the zephyr , either with the steerable balloon or the aeroplane , are sure to bound passenger dealings to the field of athletics and amusement . This is , of course , a much more considerable field than is often realized . The world is unforced to pay up very gamy price for mere amusement , and it is altogether likely that a few years hence plane flights will be a drawing card at county fair and other public occasions , just as ordinary balloon ascensions have been for a 100 past . The experience of the gamey - speed automobile , too , has proved the universe of a very large leisure time class of wealthy men who determine vent for their excess energies in undertaking all sorts of wild feat . Flight through the aura may very in all probability become as democratic a fad a few years hence as automobile racing is to - twenty-four hours ; but it will have just as small relation to the serious , practical , every - day business of carry freight and passengers for the great workaday world as have the hundred - horsepower motorcar that break speed records in France or America .

Warfare of the hereafter is n’t even seen as a possible employment for airships . As Engineering News explains , flying machines are far too vulnerable to bullets from the ground .

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It is said that the leading military nations are vying with each other at the present time in the maturation of military air - ships , but this does not prove that these anatomical structure can be made practically utile in the serious business concern of literal war … Of all the setup ever propose for enjoyment on the battle - field , a flying - machine is beyond all question the most vulnerable . It offer an ideal mug to the bullets of the foe . Its limitations of weighting veto its protective covering by any sort of armour . Had the flight - machine been educate forty or fifty year ago , when projectiles were limited to lowly speed and inadequate ranges , it might have performed some service in observing the foeman ’s forces ; but with modern infantry rifles discharging projectile with an initial speed of 2,700 feet per second , and with light heavy weapon agree to set down a pure hail - storm of heater having equal velocity and compass , the rise of an melody - ship at any pointedness within several mile of a hostile army would be merely the signal for its immediate destruction .

Engineering News was right that military airships were being formulate . These planes would advance well in the lead up to the First World War , where they were not only used for reconnaissance , but also mounted with machine guns and used for strategic bombing . In 1909 , on July 27 , the Wright Brothers tested a military airplane in Fort Meyer , Virginia . Film from the National Archives of theWright Brothers examination that planeis plant below .

This post originally look atSmithsonian.com .

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