John Chadima is active in the Eastern Iowa business community, where he maintains a portfolio of three Firehouse Subs franchises that consistently exceed $1 million each in annual revenue. Since 2013, his locations have earned recognitions such as Best Sandwich of Iowa City and a Top Ten Sandwich Shop honor in Cedar Rapids, and he supports first responders through customer donations to the Firehouse Subs Public Safety Foundation. Growing up in Cedar Rapids, John Chadima was a member of the state champion Regis High School basketball team before earning his BS in physical education and athletic administration at the University of Iowa. He went on to serve as senior associate athletic director at the University of Wisconsin-Madison from 2003 to 2012, overseeing major capital projects such as a hockey and swimming facility and renovations to Camp Randall Stadium. That history of coordinating large, historically rooted projects offers a fitting entry point into another story of ambitious engineering from centuries past: the first hot air balloon flights.
Hot air balloons have a colorful history extending well before powered flight and were an early way of providing people with a vantage point in the skies. Early uses extended beyond recreational excursions and included travel, research, mapping, and photography.
Ballooning’s roots extend as far back as the 13th-century philosopher and friar Roger Bacon, who opined that a large hollow ball, constructed of thin copper, and filled with air or liquid fire, would allow travel through the heavens. While other thinkers took up this idea, it remained in the speculative realm until the late 18th century.
The Montgolfier brothers in France began experimenting in 1782, creating a fire of damp straw and wool that inflated a stitched-together piece of fabric. This piqued the interest of the Académie Royale des Sciences, which sponsored a trip to Paris to demonstrate their technique.
By September 1783, the brothers had refined their technique, creating a voluminous 900-pound cloth balloon with a hole in it. The cotton canvas fabric was strengthened by paper, glued on both sides. They placed a pan of burning charcoal beneath this hole, as a way of inflating the tethered balloon.
Named Le Reveillon, it featured a colorful design conceived by Jean-Baptiste Reveillon, who served as director of France’s printed paper manufacturing industry. The printed motif featured the Louis XVI’s interweaving L cypher and other gold decorative elements on a sky-blue background.
The first unmanned flight of the tethered balloon was successful, which led to a second test a week before a planned demonstration before King Louis XVI and his retinue. When the balloon tore open, the Montgolfiers had to hurriedly stitch it back together. Reflecting the uncertainty of the debut flight, they decided to place a sheep, a duck, and a rooster in the wicker basket under the balloon.
At 1 pm on September 19, 1783, a cannon fired in front of the royal palace in Paris, as the king and his family joined hundreds of invited onlookers in the forecourt. The balloon slowly inflated, and 11 minutes later, a second cannon shot resounded as it took flight.
Reaching an altitude of 2,000 feet, the balloon traveled for 25 minutes before the fabric ripped and the balloon slowly descended, traversing around two miles to crossroads near the Vaucresson woods. Physician and court historian Pilatre de Rozier led an expedition to the deflated balloon, not expecting to find the animals alive.
However, the intrepid trio of aeronautical pioneers was unscathed. They were hailed as heroes, provided with spots in the Menagerie in Versailles by royal decree.
With this successful trial complete, Louis XVI was intent on proving manned flight. He first suggested the use of a condemned prisoner for the maiden flight. However, none other than de Rozier volunteered to be the first to attempt.
On November 21, he ascended the ladder alongside Marquis Francois Laurent to a circular platform beneath the balloon. They took flight for 25 minutes, feeding fire by hand through openings on both sides of the balloon’s skirt and becoming the world’s first aeronauts.
When they landed in the countryside, legend has it that the aeronauts placated farmers afraid of “demons from the sky” by sharing a bottle of champagne.
Ten days later, Nicholas Louis Robert and physicist Jacques Alexander Charles launched the first gas-powered balloon flight in Paris. This employed the lighter-than-air gas hydrogen, which Henry Cavendish had developed in 1776 with a combination of iron filings and sulphuric acid.
Rather than relying on fire and hot air to get aloft, this allowed for controlled, extended flight with the assistance of ballasts. The flight covered 25 miles and lasted two and a half hours, and this gas-powered design approach remained standard for flight until the Wright Brothers’ historic airplane flight of 1903.
About John Chadima
John Chadima is active in the Eastern Iowa business community as the owner and operator of three high-performing Firehouse Subs franchises. A Cedar Rapids native and University of Iowa graduate, he spent much of his career in college athletics administration, including service as senior associate athletic director at the University of Wisconsin-Madison from 2003 to 2012. There, he led fundraising and approvals for major capital projects, including new athletic facilities and renovations to Camp Randall Stadium.
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