The Anderson intelligencer. [volume] (Anderson Court House, S.C.) 1860-1914, 1878-07-25

pitching of the vessel, and other dis
comforts and inconvenience which were
necessary consequences of our crowded
condition and poor provision. Under
such circumstances the brain does not
work freely, nor is the hand cunning in
transclibing. There is one comfort,
however. The handwriting of most OF
this is such as to give me assurance that
it will ayenge me of my adversary, the
intelligent compositor, to whom l owe q
grudge OF long standing. My next from
Monro7ia. A. B. WILLIAMS.
THE FLYING MACHINE.
A Talk with Inventor Ritche1 About Bis
New Balloon-Cannot Go Against the
Wind.
"I have overcome. said Mr.. Ritchel,
the inventor of the new flying machine,
"the fatal objection which has always
been made to the practicability of aerial
navigation-that is, I have made ma
chine that can be steered. claim no
more. I have never pretended that a
balloon could be made to go against the
wind, and. / am sure it never could. 1t
is as ridiculous as perpetual motion
machine, and the latter will be invented
just as soon as the former"
It was on just this point that the re-
porter desired Mr.. Ritchel to express his
opinion, for an impression seemed gen.
orally to prevail that balloon has been
invented which can be made to navigate
|. the air. as successfully ASA steamship
sails tho ocean. But the inventor, who
is spending a few days in the city on
business relating to his new invention, is
anxious 10 disclaim any such pretension.
What his machine can be made to do is
to rise olJdescend at the will of the nav
igator, To sail with, and faster than q
swift wind, to hold its own against wind,
moving at the rate of from four to six
miles an hour, and to move slowly against
a three mile breeze. Mr.. Ritchel is a
professional inventor, and has taken out
nearly 100 patents in this country as
we'll as ir France, England and Canada.
His inventions have run mainly in the
direction of labor saving machinery, and
from one patent he claims to have cleared
-S75,O0O.- principal invention;" he
said, eva, machine for boring holes in
brushes aud cane seat chairs, and another
for inlaying wood, which is the only ma
chine for that purpose in existence, but
my pet idea is the flying machine"
"When did the idea occur to you 2"
"Well, think it was some time in the
year 1871. My attention was turned in
that direction, and I've been thinking it
over ever since. About nine months ago
I began working on the machine in
Bridgeport, Conn. The first public ex-
hibition was at the centennial exhibition
buildings, on the 10th of May. lex
hibited the flyer there for two weeks,
and then another week in the city of
Philadelphia. But the frst'o air ex-
hibition was at Hartford, on the 18th of
June. There were about ten thousand
people there, and the weather was per-
feet. The machine went in any direc-
ton desired, and even came back against
slight wind. In Boston, on the 4th of
July, the wind was blowing across the
common at the rate of twenty-five or
thirty mile, an hour, and I didn't want
to send the balloon up at all; but there
were q hundred thousand people there
and I didn't like to disappoint them.
So I said to Mark Tuttle, the navigator,
"Now, Marx, get her up as quick as q
fash or you'll blow against the houses"
He went up like streak and only miss.
ed the trees by twenty feet. The wind
took him like fash out of town and he
finally landed at Dover. The crowd
stood there waiting for him to come
back against the wind and go up again,
and we couldn't explain that that was
impossible. There were 200 refreshment
booths along the sidewalks and around,
and the owners told every one the bal
loon would be back in half an hour. So
the crowd stood there from 2 o'clock till
s waiting for the machine to come back.
The man goG back about 5 on the train,
and I was afraid to take the balloon up
to the commons for fear mob might de-
stroy it."
"How do you propose ever to utilize
the invention 7" 'a
"In a hundred ways. As soon as I
have perfected it and people come to un-
derstand it thoroughly it will come into
use. Even now I've had ever SO many
applications for machines but q man
couldn't use one if he had it. This one
is small and intended only for exhibi-
tions, under cover. The weight of the
cylinder or balloon is go pounds, of the
machine proper 48, and Mark weighs 96,
SO the weight is 2O4 pounds. But am
going to make a bigger one during the
next six months that will carry two heavy
men. You see I don't have to carry any
ballast or waste any gas, so I need only
5000 cubic feet of gas. Now, the pro.
pelling fan is equal to 500 cubic feet of
hydrogen in raising the balloon and to
IS pounds of ballast in lowering it. The
thing is run entirely by hand and is
nothing in size compared with all the
others that have been tried in this coun-
atry and elsewhere. The propelling-that
is, the raising and lowering fans only
twenty inches in diameter and makes
1000 revolutions minute. The steer
ing fan is two inches smaller and re-
wolves $3.50 tirnes,a minute.
The machine is propelled by turning
wheel bya handle, and is steered by
the foot resting on treadles, the naviga-
tor sitting astride the machine. The
advantage Of this over all other balloons
is that it can be- made to fly swifter than
the wind and to cross from side to side
of current of air moving in any direc-
ton tillsanother current is reached NOV
ing toward another point By rising or
descending and moving in various di-
rections favorable current will inevita-
bly, be reached to bear the aeronaut on
his proposed journey. When the big
machine is made propose to send it on
trip from New York to Chicago, to
make the voyage in six hours. But this
one is too small for extensive travelling.
Where there is no wind it will travel
six or seven miles an hour. goes up
mile in a minute, and comes down
in two minutes. I have never been in