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Show ft . t&fo FACHUTE JUMPER." I BY WILLIAM ALLEN JOHNSTON. Twenty-odd years ago this advertisement was prominently promi-nently displayed in the San Francisco dailies: ' ' ANNO UNO KM IS NT J3XTRAOR DINAR Y. "Tomorrow, at o oV.Iock sharp, Aeronaut Thomas S. Baldwin will drop J000 feel from a balloon, at Golden Galo park." Tlio announcement caused no end of amazement nnd no little incredulity; even the officials of the traction trac-tion company whioh advertised I he feat were not whollv convinced of its possibility. They knew the aeronaut nnd had reason 1o respect deeply his daring. Two years before he had walked a iiglit wire stretched from the Cliff House to u point on the high, precipitous coast. lie was blindfolded, and away beneath him were cresting and pounding tlio brcak'ers of Ihe Pacific. Pa-cific. No such aerial feat had ever .been attempted before; il evidenced daring supreme: but to drop from the sky to the earth .1000 iect! That seemed beyond the pale of daring; it was suicidal. Few hnd ever attempted at-tempted it; none had survived it. Onc thousand feet?" repeated the doubting offi- "Yes, or higher." said Baldwin ooollv. "Why do you want to do il?" asked "one man. Baldwin laughed. "It's my business," said he. "I'll have to charge you a. dollar a foot. I'll drop more than a thousand feet, or less, but no less than Ave hundred. L prefer at least a thousand feet. You sec, T expect to survive aud collect." And he did. Thirty thousand persons flocked out to Golden Galo pnrk. They saw the preparations a firo built out of barrel slaves and coal oil; a short, covered trench leading to a heap of cloth, the dirty gray folds of which began to unroll and distend with the hot air y an rushing from the trench. When tlio balloon was elevated from the ground and held swaying from guy ropes in the bands of a dozen men. they saw suspended beneath it a long collapsed fold of canvas and a tangle of ropes. The ropes wero arranged in sets of eight and numbered tlurty-rwo in all. They were snap-hooked to a stout metal ring aud underneath hung a trapeze. There was a gasivof excitement when (ho aeronaut, attired in acrobatic costume, walked out of a tent. He secjned the least concerned of all, giving orders coolly and watching everything with a critical eye. To ,be a successful parachute jumper even toda- "requires "re-quires a scientific knowledge of ballooning. This it pioneer aeronaut, howcvci'N had nothing whatever to . guide him in 1 ho 'way of previous experience of others. V Moreover, the responsibility of having every single detail of tho ascent perfect lay wholly upon his shoulders'. Jle paid most attention to those thirty-two ropes, seeing that each bun" straight and was in no danger of becoming ontangled. If the latter hnppcncd it; . meant that tho limp canvas sack would not open when it was cut loose in midair from tho balloon above it; that it would not float him gently back to earth; that instead his dangling body would shoot down like a meteor and bury itself in its own self-anado self-anado grave. Shooting High in Air. There was one other rope to be tested, a longer rope than the others, that, hung from the very top of the parachute. It had a knife attachment at. its upper cud, which, when the aeronaut pulled it from his perch on th'o trapeze below, severed the stoat rope that connected the parachute and balloon. This the. aeronaut tested and then walked swiftlv to the trapeze and look a firm hold on the bar. "Good-,by." "Good-,by." he said, and then, suddenly, "Evcrvbodv let; go! " hey saw hiin shoot swiftly into the air with a force that seemed to elongate' his body and make it stiff and straight as a board. Then thev saw him laboriously musc.Io himself up and swing his legs over the bar. Tie waved back at them once, twice, and then, as their last roar of applause died awav m a vast silence of suspense, he was seen only as a dangling black speck beneath the balloon, shooting higher, higher I Suddenly, ns the balloon poised for an instant and then seemed to drift, an almost inaudiblo pistol shot cracked forth from the heavens. A frenzied yell burst from tho crowd. They saw tho black speck pitch suddenly downward, whilo the balloon at the same instant turned turtle, parti' collapsed and floated fiway with tho wind. Down, down eamo the speck of hnmanitv. and then suddenly the trailing, twisting thing directly above it spread out like a mushroom. 'The parachuto!" yelled an onlooker, and the cry, with an evident note ot" relief, went echoing over the grounds. They saw it. poised graceful I v in midair nearly a thousand feet 'overhead, and then slowly descend with a gentle, oscillating motion. In a moment they were rushing pell-mell over gardens and shrubbery and in another moment they wero crowding a thousand deep about a man who had stepped out of tho clouds and now stood upright upon his feet, unharmed and smiling back at them in his grim, confident way. And, turning to the heretofore incredulous crowd, he said coolly, just as Orvillc Wright, to those who saw his first success- . ful airship 'flight at Fort IMycr: "WIja-, I knew E. could do it." Baldwin knew he could do it because he had been experimenting with his new parachute for many weeks, sending it down first with a bag of sand as a weight, and then for short jumps from the rafters oC a lofty building with himself hanging to the ring. A century previous tho French aeronaut Farnerun had perfected a parachute, ribbed like an umbrella, with-which ho' safely dropped a dog from a eaplivo balloon. bal-loon. With human' freight, however, it oscillated too violently, and sonic years later an Englishman, Cocking, Cock-ing, decided to invert the umbrella, lie dropped from-a from-a balloon at a considerable height and was iound in a stubble fiold. his bodv crushed into a shapeless mass and half -buried in the earth. Since Baldwin's first successful jump with his canvas-rope parachuto there have been thousands of descents, and the parachuto jump has become a com- nion "thriller" at county fairs and amusement parks.. Perhaps a round hundred men and some women have engaged in this most hazardous of all aerial feats. But. that is the "show" side of the parachute. There is another, inoro important, side. Jn the case of Captain Cap-tain Baldwin and Leo Slovens the parachute has been made the forerunner of aerial navigation; first, by showing results previously believed to bo unattainable, un-attainable, and, second, by adding valuablo data to aeronautical science. . Jump Always Thrills. . Parachute jumping has become common, but it has never ceased 'to lie thrilling. To tho onlooker there's a breathlessness, a. wonderment incited that no other daring can call forth. To sec that tiny speck of a man high up In the heavens: to realize that his sole hold on life is a canvas umbrella; that ho is at the utter mercv of the unknown, ungovernable, capricious air currents; that an accident means certain death; that ho has nothing to light with, nothing to cling to, no hopo wbatovcr ono grows to wonder," just as that San Francisco traction official wondered, why and how a man does it. "It's all in gel ting used to it," the experienced aeronaut aero-naut says. Thar, first air cleaving rush from tho ground is hardest on tho novice. There's a roar in his ears like the coming of a cyclone, a pulsi ug liko the booming of monster waves. His body, straightening liko an iron rod, seems to have enormous weights upon tho feet, and his arms aro almost dislocated, "is one but a strong man could stand tho muscular tension. But this first strain is gone as tho .balloon steadies itself. The relief is i'elt in the way of a ploasaut, dreamy sensation. Tho blaro of tho "band, tlio swelling swell-ing applause, ' tho strange exhilaration all bring hope back to the heart and a. weird 'spirit of reckless bravado. Then comes tho cutting loose. "Whish!" Tho breath leaves, again tho body is clamped in that, viccliko grip, a flash of unearthly light, another cyclonic roar, and then that dreamy, floating sensation again as tho parachuto opens after that first swift pluriga of ono hundrod-odd feet. -As in ballooning, the parachute jumper's sensation is that of being stationary. "When ho ascends tho earth seems to bo falling from under him with breathless breath-less rapidity. "When ho drifts tlio crowds look as if they wero walking nway; when ho drops tho earth scorns darting up at him. Tho terror of this last illusion may bo judged from an oxporionee of Leo Stovens in Montreal'. 'When I opened my eves," said ho, "after tho first rv.m1I; drop, X. saw tho city surging up at me, aud in tho middle and directly under mo was tho tall, slender spire of Notre Dnmo. "It seemed like a pivotal point a.bout which tho city grow as a kaleidoscope doos from tho contor. Tho filiar ppoint of it was rushing at mo as if I "wero a magnet. For an instant I felt as if wo wrc tho center of a small revolving world, being drawn irresistibly irre-sistibly together, and tlte idea of swift impalement 'upon that; sharp point made my flesh creep." Tho experienced jumper can gonerallv guide his parachute by pulling on tho ropes and t'ilfmg it, and in this way he is often enabled to land at tho point of ascent or to escape houses and trees. On this occasion ''Terrible!" said Stevens. "Here givo them this." H He offered a 2 bill. !M "All of this'J" gasped the interpreter, and then, amid H great jubilation, f,he balloon was packed and loaded H with willing hands. As the aeronaut drovo away H with his prize tho door of the village tavern ttu jH swinging with unusual rapidity aud many pailB wJka M being carried out, the tops of which were foamy. ll Many hairbreadth escapes have .boon made by t,h U export guidance of the parachute when nearing the fl earth. It is at this stage of the descent that tho IH jumper's best skill is called into play. IH During Cnptain Baldwin's exhibition trip abroad t H in I8SS he- nutdc a jump of ;000 feet at Alexandria H nalace, London, before, the Princo of "Wales and tho ,H Balloon Society of Great Britain. H Just before lie grasped tho bar, Baldwin turned and H shook hands with the 'present King Edward "VI J. H "I'll be back in a momont," he said laughingly. ICnglishmon have a way of accepting literally such 'M statements. The group about the princo nodded I gravely. Thoro was just a twinkle in the latter 's eye, II but he added: "I will wait here for you." Baldwin was, of course, in no way aerious in his ? chance remark, but the unexpected happened. A con- f course of shifting air currents carried him down from i the sky and dropped him gently almost dircctlv at the Prince of Wales's feet. The latter, with spontaneous spon-taneous enthusiasm, pressed upon him a diamond ving, Avhilo the Balloon society, in token of their admiration, admira-tion, presented later a huge gold medal sonorously 1 worded. While abroad, Baldwin floated over Mount. Vesuvius, made a parachute leap before the King of Siam and Pome daring descents 'in Australia. In Russia the j troops were called out to quell the riotous enthusiasm I occasioned by his exploits before a band of students; in Tokio he dropped into a morass and had sunk to I his neck before a rescuing party arrived. j His most miraculous escape from "death, however, happened at his home town of Quincv, Til. He had previously made a descent here of oOOl'i feet. Later, J after perfecting his parachute bv halving the weight I and doubling its resistance area, he determined to iunvp I IOjOOO feet. 1 Parachute Pails to Work. j The afternoon of the ascent a -wind of considerable and increasing velocity sprang up. However, ho ' passed--through this and was in. a comparative calm 1 when he cut loose, two miles abovo. the earth. Down he shot; and then that horror of the parachuto jumper happened. His parachute would not open! The , wind had tangled the rope?. I That midair descent strangled him and all but de- ' stroyed his consciousness. He remembers very little except that he suddenly passed into the semi-dai'kncsa of a black cloud and felt a new force about him. Ho had dropped into the "wind strata and was being ! whirled diagonally along -with terrific force. That wind which had caused his undoing might, prove hl savior if its transverso force would continue all tho ' way down to earth. He had no hope, iiowevcr. Liko other aeronauts in similar predicaments, ho accepted death even calmly voiced that acceptance to himself. As ho was swept, over the city ho was conscious of his townspeople below, and a strange thought entered his mind. The' could see him and were aware of his fat.c. They knew that ho was clinging blindly to an ; instrument of certain death. Would they judge him a coward if he continued to hold on? They knew and I held him highly as a brave man. Would it not be better to perpetuate that reputation? If he wero to die anyway, ought he not to make a fitting ending tit his career by deliberately dropping just over the city of his own will ? Something checked the resolve almost tho moment he made it; it was th.it grim determination to live so fundamentally strong in all of us. In another moment he was watching tho racing earth beneath him a wood, a river, an open field speculating on his chances if that; wind stratum lasted, ej'cs wide open, muscles tense and ready for some extreme effort. They' found, him in that open field, stunned and bleeding, but alive and whole. Today he laughs over ; the episode if a fall of 10,000 feet may from any standpoint be styled 'an "episode." Baldwin's career of "fighting the" air," as. ho calls 5c, is a most remark- able ono. He lias never suffered an injury as serious j as the breaking of a boue. The big fees received by the pioneer parachute jumpers Baldwin got nearly ."jHOOO and a medal worth several hundred for a 'single descent at Quincy, and Stevens often made .t'2-500 for one Hay's work-attracted work-attracted many daring and irresponsible persons into the field. Some were roving spirits to whom chaneu ' misfortune niado ready money seem more to be de- t sired than life. They had courage, but no aeronautical i knowledge, and many wero killed so many, in fact, that several slates hastened to pnss laws prohibiting tho dangerous descent. In New York stale the statute still holds. There aro dangers enough in the air. it would seem. for the experienced aeronaut alone. Stevens tells of a. perilous descent at Niagara. When at a consider j able height two adverso "currents of air caught ins c "THE DISTANCE LEFT WAS BARELY ENOUGH TO OPEN THE PARACHUTE." j however, try as ho would, tho aeronaut glided straight down-toward tho spiro, nnd, with a last.' tilt of tho parachute, ho was thrown with a jolt upon the very lop of 'it, -SO feet abovo the city.' Lowered to Safety. A wild clamor filled tho streets; crowds came rushiug from ovory direction; tho fotc day was forgotten,. and soon tho 'roofs of noighboriug-houses wero. covered with excited, gesticulating groups of French Canadians. Cana-dians. Stevens coolly sot about making his own rescue. Ho gathcrod in his collapsed parachute, cut tho cloth into long strips and fashioned a strong ropo, with which ho suspended himself far enough down tho spiro to clamber into a small window. Within ho dropped from crossbeam to cfronsbcam till ho reached tho bell platform, and thenco mado his way ,by ladders to tho chapel bojow. Ho resisted tho ovation offered him and drovo hurriedly hur-riedly out in tho country in tho direction his balloon had taken. Somo miles out ho found it in tho possession posses-sion of a group of inhabitants, who with much jargon and many gestures gavo him to understand that, they would not surrender it. At; length an interpreter appeared. ap-peared. "What do they want1?" asked tho exasperated aeronaut. A brief colloquy was held with tho captors. "H.'mJ" said tho interpreter. "Thov say a balloon does not fall overy day. They want 50"conls!,; balloon and exploded it as ono would burst an in- llated paper bag in tho hands. . He was dangling from the bar when he heard tho sharp report, and in an instant the .balloon, para- H chute and aeronaut woro whirling swittly down to :H a point dangerously near tho great gorge. .H Ho was littlo more than 1000 feet iir the air. and such a descent, though it seems an eternity to ino ,H hapless jumper, is really accomplished in a fraction ,.! of a minute. There is littlo tirno to act. The ono .H movo that can bo mado must bo the right one. fljl Almost simultaneously with the explosion. Slovens .H swung himself to an upright position on the bar. rio tM could cut loose his rigging was not befouled but in ,H that, act he saw swiftlv that he must, also swing clear of fho collapsed balloon abovo him. Othorwiso it W would catch and sweep him down in its precipitous AM descent. flH Ho cut loose and pulled dosperatoly upon his para- 'H chuto ropes at tho samo instant. For an infinitesimal moment his life hung by a thread. Ho felt a clutch at his heart, and then tho heavier balloon shot by him, brushing his cheok. Tho distauco left was barely enough to opon tho jH parachuto barely enough, too. for tho aeronaut to jH tilt it away from tho shoer cliff of the gorge, "But L did it," wid Stevens, and he. too, laughed 'over tho tM memory of what strikes a landsman ns little less Inim a miracle VH : il |
