These are the voyages of the Balloon Enterprise: its mission, to seek out and tattle on Confederate positions, to boldly go where no silk gas bag had gone before.

Here is a story about the Enterprise, a ground-breaking balloon. Like its later, fictional namesake¹, it suffered damage, got lost, set a speed record, and crashed several times. You shall learn. But first, we must meet Professor Lowe, whom the US National Air and Space Museum refers to as 'the grandfather of the United States Air Force².

A Man with a Dream and a Good Line of Patter

Thaddeus Sobieski Constantine Lowe (1832 – 1913) had little formal schooling and no money to start with, but he loved science. He was also fascinated by the idea of flight. His first attempt, sometime before his fourteenth year, involved a kite, a lantern, and a very angry tomcat. At fourteen he joined the entourage of Professor Reginald Dinkelhoff, who did chemistry demonstrations to a paying public. A couple of years later, he bought out Professor Dinkelhoff and became Professor Lowe. In those days, all you needed to be called 'professor' was some good material and a calling card. This was, after all, the age of PT Barnum, and TSC Lowe, like Barnum, was New England born and bred.

Lowe was enthusiastically self-taught and – you will pardon the expression – an enterprising showman. He did well on the lecture circuit – people back then were as easily bored as they are now, and there was no radio, television, or internet. So they would pay to sit in a lecture hall and listen to educational stuff. They'd even pay to see slide shows. The alternative was sitting at home playing cards or listening to the kids recite their party pieces, which goes a long way toward explaining the popularity of early TED talks.

In 1855 Lowe met and fell in love with another show business personality, an actress from France named Leontine. Leontine and Thaddeus went on to have a happy marriage and ten children together. Leontine also embraced her husband's lifelong love of flight. When he started making balloons, she sewed the silk pieces that went together to make the bags. She was his biggest fan. Lowe's father also joined the family business.

These gas-filled balloons are also called 'aerostats', from the Greek αηρ (air) and σταος (standing). The French were pioneers in balloon-making. For that reason, US newspaper reports sometimes referred to gas-filled transportation devices as 'montgolfieres' after the Montgolfier Brothers. The French military had used an aerostat named L'Entreprenant ('the enterprising one') at the Battle of Fleury in 1794. There is no indication that this influenced Lowe's choice of name for his balloon, as there had already been four US ships named Enterprise by this time. Lowe is said to have picked the name because of his 'enterprising' New England nature.

On 7 July, 1858, Lowe made his first flight aboard Enterprise, which was powered by coal gas. People took Professor Lowe seriously, as they should. He'd invented his own formula for the varnish on the balloon bag. He'd designed an improved altimeter³. He had interesting theories about how to use the jet stream – high-altitude winds – to navigate. To make use of these winds, an aeronaut either discarded ballast (sand) to rise, or partially deflated the bag to descend. It wasn't a dilithium crystal, but it was pretty impressive for its time.

Like Wernher von Braun, Thaddeus Lowe had a dream. Lowe's was to be the first to fly across the Atlantic Ocean in a balloon. But as with von Braun, there was an obstacle in the form of a war. As so often happens, innocent exploration had to take a back seat to military greed for technology.

A Speed Record and an Arrest (or Two)

Lowe planned to make a really big balloon to cross the Atlantic in, and that required deep-pocket backing. To raise awareness and needed cash, he spent 1859 and 1860 giving rides to prominent people, curious fellow-enthusiasts, and newspaper reporters who could be counted on to gush for a column inch or two. In early 1861 he was doing the same thing in Cincinnati on 20 April, just before he and Enterprise set off for Washington, DC.

At least, that's where he thought he was going.

Lowe ended up in Unionville, South Carolina, quite a bit south of Washington. The good news was: he'd set a speed record, covering at least 900 miles in the 9 hours of flight between 4 a.m. and 1 p.m.. The bad news was: South Carolina wasn't in the United States at this time, having seceded from the Union the previous December. The even worse news was: the United States was now at war with South Carolina and had been, in fact, for over a week.

Lowe was taken prisoner as a 'Yankee spy'. At least, he was taken prisoner after he'd convinced the locals he wasn't an extraterrestrial. Or the devil. He ended up in the Unionville jail. However, he was rescued by the town's newspaper editor, AW Thomson. Thomson and others signed a certificate attesting to the speed record – for proof of where he'd been, Lowe had brought along the Cincinnati late-edition papers, hot off the press. As direct service to the enemy capital had been suspended, Lowe and Enterprise were bundled onto a train headed back to Cincinnati by way of Louisville, Kentucky.

He got as far as Columbia, South Carolina, before being arrested again.

This time, the mayor bailed him out. It pays to be famous. The citizens of Columbia reckoned the Professor was a scientist, not a spy. They sent him on his way. Back in Cincinnati, he reinflated Enterprise and gave more rides to more journalists.

BALLOON ASCENSION YESTERDAY. – Professor Lowe made a second ascent from this city yesterday, in his balloon, accompanied by Junius H Browne, of the DAILY PRESS, WW West, and TC Freneau....

The ballast being rather heavy, the basket swayed to and fro in the crowd several times, but it finally moved off in a south-easterly direction, at an angle of about twenty five degrees, which necessitated the casting off of a portion of the ballast, to avoid the roofs of the houses. As the voyagers moved smoothly away they waved handkerchiefs to the crowd, who responded with enthusiastic cheers, and other demonstrations of interest in their welfare [sic]....

It is the intention of the Professor to descend, after having traveled an hour or two, discharge the passengers, and then proceed in his observations, as in his last voyage.

– Cincinnati Daily Press, 9 May, 1861

After this, Professor Lowe set out for Washington again.

This time, he ended up in Ottawa, Canada.

General of the Skies? Seriously?

When he finally got to Washington (by train), Lowe was sure about one thing: transatlantic balloon crossings could wait. The Union had to be saved first. So he reinflated Enterprise and set about convincing the US government that they needed an air force. In practical terms, this was a bit easier than it sounds. That was because Abraham Lincoln, another fierce autodidact, was a technophile.

Lowe gave demonstrations, and many were impressed.

To-day [20 June] Professor Lowe ascended, from the Armory lot. The capacity of the balloon was 20,000 cubic feet. It was provided with signal flags and a powerful telescope; but as the ascent was made late in the afternoon, and chiefly for the purpose of testing the practicability of maintaining a magnetic circuit and operating in the balloon, no reconnoisance [sic] was attempted. A circuit was established by looping one of the adjacent telegraph wires – the one between Alexandria and the War Department – with helix wires several hundred feet in length, wound upon a reel at the spot from which the ascent was made. The helix wires are very fine and flexible. They communicated with a delicate pocket Morse apparatus carried by the operator in the balloon. The helixes were paid out from the reel as rapidly as the ropes attached to the balloon. An ascent of five or six hundred feet was made, and the telegraphic arrangement worked charmingly. When at the utmost elevation attained, dispatches were sent to the President of the United States through the War Department.

After demonstrating the success of the experiment, Prof Lowe was tugged through the streets in his balloon, a distance of over half a mile, to the open lawn south of the White House, when the balloon was safely anchored for the night, with a view to repeat the experiment to-morrow, in the presence of the President and the Cabinet. With this telegraphic apparatus, and the means of making an aerial reconnoisance [sic], a General may be accurately informed of everything that may be going on within a long day's march of his position in any direction.

–  Daily National Democrat, 09 July, 1861

Lowe demonstrated Enterprise to Lincoln and his Cabinet. He even sent Lincoln a telegram from the air. Lincoln was impressed, his advisors less so.

Politics in Washington being what there were, not everyone was accepting of the idea of aerial 'reconnoisance'. One wag suggested that Professor Lowe was bucking for the title of 'General of the Skies'. And of course the controversy went national. Some wit in Cincinnati was moved to poetry:

Professor Lower would fain get high

At Government expense;

With big balloon he'd scale the moon

To spy Virginia fence;

To spot the camps of rebel Scamps

With telegraph and glass -

You ask me, friend, how will this end?

And I reply - in gas!

– Cincinnati Commercial, 28 June, 1861

It would take a test under fire to prove Enterprise's worth.

Don't Shoot! I'm on Your Side!

Lowe's chance came in mid-July, during the Battle of Bull Run. Lowe sent valuable information from his perch above the action. To get a better look, he untethered the balloon. When he started to descend, the Union troops started firing on the UFO. When they shouted, 'Show your colours!' Lowe realised he wasn't carrying a flag.

Memo to self: put some identifying marks on this thing. This is no doubt why subsequent depictions show Lowe's balloon basket in a red-white-and-blue flag motif. It's also why Lowe learned to line his basket with metal. Between friendly fire and distinctly unfriendly fire, the Professor soon became the most shot-at man in the Civil War.

In the meantime, Lowe flew Enterprise higher to get away from the troops. He finally came down two miles away –   behind Confederate lines. This was not good. The 31st New York Infantry caught up with him, but unfortunately, he couldn't go with them. He'd sprained his ankle badly and couldn't walk. Also, he didn't want to lose Enterprise to the enemy. He'd have to wait for rescue.

Which arrived in the form of his wife Leontine. Advised of her husband's location by the 31st New York, she hitched up a buckboard and disguised herself as a farm woman. Embellished versions of this tale have her smearing herself with cow manure for greater verisimilitude. We won't swear to that. We have no information as to whether Leontine was a method actress. We can report that she brought the Professor and the Enterprise home safely.

The next day, the Balloon Corps was a done deal. The National Air and Space Museum has the document, a card hand-written by a president.

Will Lieut. Gen'l. Scott please see Professor Lowe, over Mon about his balloon? A Lincoln July 25, 1861

A further note: that card didn't work as well as Lowe had hoped. General Winfield Scott kept him waiting most of the day, 'too busy' to see him. It was not until Lowe returned with the president himself that Scott issued the necessary orders to make Lowe 'Chief of the Corps of Aeronautics of the United States Army.'

Notes for the Future

Lowe built more and bigger balloons. They were effective. The Confederates wanted their own balloon, of course. They tried making it of cotton, which they had plenty of due to the Union blockade. Cotton didn't work too well, but silk was hard to obtain (see Union blockade). So they raided the dress goods shops of the South for bolts of dress silk. The Confederacy's balloon was very colourful, and probably would have won the war on aesthetics.

Lowe often took officers up in his balloons as observers. This caused some military men to discover for the first time that they had a fear of heights. One of these was George Armstrong Custer, who sort of cowered in the basket and had to be cajoled into standing up.

In 1863, Lowe quit, wearied by stress, health problems, underfunding, and bureaucratic red tape. He moved to Philadelphia and invented an ice machine. The Balloon Corps – and the Enterprise   – had done yeoman's service.

Shortly after the war, a German aristocrat and military man was on an expedition to Minnesota. There he ran across a balloon demonstrator who used to fly for the Balloon Corps. The German aristocrat took a ride. It changed his life, and the world. It took a few years, but Graf von Zeppelin put Professor Lowe's ideas to good use.

Lowe never succeeded in crossing the Atlantic in his gas-filled balloon. The challenge remained open for another century. Many unsuccessful attempts were made. In fact, the johnny-come-lately heavier-than-air aeroplane crossed the Atlantic in 1927, a year before the LZ 127 Graf Zeppelin made its first (powered) transatlantic flight. Sport enthusiasts continued to pursue the goal of making it across the Atlantic in a non-powered gas or hot-air balloon. They finally made it, but it took a lot more money and more modern materials than Thaddeus Lowe ever had.

In July, 1978, Sir Richard Branson and Per Lindstrand crossed the Atlantic in a hot-air balloon. Starting in Maine, they briefly touched down in Ireland (long enough to demolish a stone wall) before both pilots bailed out into the ocean.

In August of the same year, Ben Abruzzo, Maxie Anderson and Larry Newman made the trip aboard the Double Eagle II in a (helium) gas-filled balloon. It took them 137 hours. They flew from Maine to Paris. Their gondola was named The Spirit of Albuquerque.