05/02/2021
The very popular Hot Air Balloons over Baltinglass Abbey print on an upcycled ready to frame 1870’s French Dictionary page. I did this print a few years back to celebrate the short lived Baltinglass Hot Air Balloon Festival in honour of the Baltinglass Balloon Pioneer
Richard Crosbie (1755-1824) from Crosbie Park, near Baltinglass, County Wicklow the first Irishman to make a manned flight. He flew in a hydrogen air balloon from Ranelagh, on Dublin’s southside to Clontarf, on Dublin’s northside on 19 January 1785. Crosbie launched, from an exhibition area at Ranelagh Gardens, Dublin his “Grand Air Balloon and Flying Barge” in which he intended to cross the Irish Sea. His achievement occurred just 14 months after the first-ever manned balloon flight by the Montgolfier Brothers in France and is commemorated by a memorial located at the site of this historic event & commissioned by Dublin City Council
Crosbie launched several balloons containing animals before attempting the first human flight on Irish soil. One of which, containing a cat, was seen passing over the west coast of Scotland, before descending near the Isle of Man. The cat and the balloon were both rescued by a passing ship. The balloonists of the eighteenth century, pioneers in the first successful method of conquest of the air, were men of science comparable to the astronauts of the 1960s, attracting the same public excitement and receiving similar international publicity. Check out my huge collection of ready to frame balloon prints. Link in bio
