Postal Air Balloon

[Dave Monroe]

Postal Air Balloon
(Balthasar Anton Dunker, 1784)

In 1783, the Montgolfier brothers launched the first hot air balloon.
Their triumph over the skies produced a craze for these floating
marvels and gave rise to innumerable fantasies of a future shaped by
air travel. The print “Aerostate de Poste” of 1784 pictures the air
mail vehicle of the future: the number 2440 seen below the crown
references the future society of Louis-Sébestien Mercier’s The Year
2440 (though no such balloon appears in the novel). Equipped for far
more than delivering mail, this postal balloon offers a veritable
compendium of technological essentials for the period. In addition to
scientific instruments (the telescope on the left) and military
equipment (the canon on the right), the balloon carries a “great organ
for use in serenades.” Of all musical instruments, the organ best
symbolized technological complexity, grandeur, and communication with
the heavens. Built into the air ship, its pipes visible under the
harp-like curve at the bow, the organ unites music and transportation,
offering an imaginary predecessor to the steamboat calliope and the
car radio.

http://imaginaryinstruments.org/postal-air-balloon/
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Pynchon-l / http://www.waste.org/mail/?list=pynchon-l