First Untethered Flight: Balloons Take to Paris Skies

A wicker basket carrying two men rose above the Château de la Muette and drifted over Paris, watched by hundreds of thousands of astonished spectators. Jean-François Pilâtre de Rozier, a young physics teacher, and François Laurent, Marquis d'Arlandes, had just become the first human beings to achieve sustained, free flight. The date was November 21, 1783, and the age of aviation had begun in a craft made of paper-lined taffeta and heated air. The Montgolfier brothers, Joseph-Michel and Jacques-Étienne, had spent months perfecting their hot air balloon after observing smoke rising from a fire. King Louis XVI initially insisted the first passengers be condemned criminals, but Pilâtre de Rozier lobbied successfully to take the honor himself. The Marquis d'Arlandes, an infantry officer with connections at court, secured the second spot. Their balloon stood 75 feet tall and was decorated with gold fleur-de-lis against a deep blue background. The flight lasted approximately 25 minutes and covered about five and a half miles across Paris, reaching an altitude of roughly 3,000 feet. Pilâtre de Rozier and d'Arlandes fed the fire with straw and wool while using wet sponges to douse embers that threatened to burn through the fabric. They landed safely in the Butte-aux-Cailles district, toasting their success with champagne brought by spectators who rushed to meet them. The achievement electrified Europe. Benjamin Franklin, watching from the Tuileries Garden, famously responded to a skeptic who asked what use a balloon was: "What is the use of a new-born baby?" Within two years, balloonists had crossed the English Channel. Pilâtre de Rozier himself would die in 1785 attempting that same crossing, becoming aviation's first fatality. The dream that carried him over Paris also carried him to his grave.