The Birmingham age-herald., 1907-03-31
LAST OF BALLOON GYMNAST

Blissfield CMich) Cor. St. Louis Republic.
 n ECENTLY there was held in the TX home of MT. and Mrs. David Bel
 cher, of this village, a strange funeral service. Friends gathered and
 others sent floral tributes; relatives truly
 mourned, and Rev. A. Beamer, a Presby- terian clergyman, conducted the usual service and preached the usual discourse. But there was no casket; no dead body. Him whom they mourned was David M. Belcher, a son, and he had been buried a
 month earlier in Para, Brazil, where he had met death by falling from parachute while descending from balloon. The &C., cident happened December 2l, and on Christ Day he died, his parents in Bliss field being in ignorance of this the while. The dead aeronaut was 35 years old, was born in Bliss1eld, and ''railroaded' on the Lake Shore railroad for a time.
 One day, after making his run into To- ledo. he fell In with a balloonist-for 1t
 was in the days when a balloon ascension
 was popular diverslon-and young Bel
 cher hired out to the man to learn the
 balloon business In short time he was
 making balloon ascensions himself, and made hundreds of them. never sustain ing an injury until that which cost his life.
 Of late years the balloon business has faded from interest, owing to the more complicated experiments made in aerial navigation, and Belcher, knowing this, or ganized the Prof. D. D. Belcher Bal loon and Amusement company with
 Il, A .-,o 1nr- city of his entertainment and of the bal loon ascension made him popular attrac- ton, and he was in great demand in the larger South American cities. His wife and three children live in Toledo, O.
 The death of Belcher calls to mind how the famous balloonists are fast passing from the field of action. In the distant future, when aerial navigation shall have become an accomplished fact, and when some historian will search for the seed be- ginnings of the idea of aerial flight, Michi- gan will take her place in that history as
 the balloon state.
 No state in the union, it Is believed, ever
 produced so many balloonists, What. with the Hogans of national and international
 fame, Belcher, Bannister, and a host of other lights who purveyed the entertain ment without the reward of wide reputa- ton, Michigan probably leads the world for this class of daring, meaning the dar- ing of men who navigated aerial heights
 in hot-air bags.
 As early as 1851 there is record of
 man who ran a hotel in Rome township,
 startled the state by making balloon
 ascension from the corners of the then
 principal streets in Adrian, the "com-
 mons" as they were called. In that day there was no provision for the balloonist alighting to the ground by parachute in
 case of accident, and 1t was risky bus mess to attempt a descent.
 Canister hoped to make a lot of money by his ascension. and a large part of the "commons" was fenced in, and admit tance fec charged. A better view could be obtained outside, however, and few paid, much to Bannister's chagrin. His flight that day was the longest then on
 record. For the few paltry dollars the crowd was willing to give him. he as-
 cended into the air at Adrian. and after a journey of intense suffering, landed 400 miles away in the Allegheny moun- tains. He was nearly frozen to death
 and found wildcat bank more profit able afterward becoming proprietor of one of those institutions. But his ex- ample as balloonist inspired other men to daring feats, and a large number of asprants for aerial honors sprang up. Of course. the name of the Hogan boys will be mentioned as long as the balloon Is remembered in this state. The Hogans made their headquarters at Jack son, in this state. and one of them John was killed at the last state exposition held in Detroit, by falling from the trapeze bar of a balloon. William Hogan, last of the brothers, died not long ago in Jackson.
 The most famous of the brothers was Ed whose disappearance was as dazzling as his whole career as an aeronaut Edward was only 14 years old when he
 made his first ascension. This was at Ypsilanti From that time until the date of his last ascent in 1889 he made 800 ascensions. Not only has he this re- | markable record, but his is still the rec ord of making the highest parachute drop recorded-a fall of 5000 feet or one and a half miles.
 For this king of the Hogans is also claimed the distinction of having made
 tha first ascension ever made in an air.