Park Van Tassel

Park Albert Van Tassel (b.1853-d.1930) was a pioneering aerial exhibitionist in the United States. Van Tassel made the first balloon flight in New MexicoTom Crouch, The Eagle Aloft: Two Centuries of the Balloon in America, Smithsonian Press, Washington, D.C., 1983The New York Times, September 14, 1930https://www.fai.org/sites/default/files/documents/rpt_l_first_national_flights.pdf and helped invent and introduce methods of parachute jumping from balloons.Anton Westman, Dangers in Sport Parachuting, Umea Universitet, Department of Surgical and Perioperative Sciences, 2009, pg. 14, https://www.diva-portal.org/smash/get/diva2:202326/FULLTEXT02 His efforts helped introduce ballooning and parachuting internationally and also helped introduce women to these sports.Gary Fogel, Sky Rider: Park Van Tassel and the Rise of Ballooning in the West, University of New Mexico Press, Albuquerque, NM, 2021
==New Mexico==
In May, 1882 Van Tassel expressed interest in making a balloon ascension at Albuquerque, New Mexico.Albuquerque Daily Journal, May 27, 1882 After a full day of inflation with coal gas from the Albuquerque Gas Works, Van Tassel made the first human flight in New Mexico at 6:15pm on July 4, 1882. He launched from an area near Second Street between Railroad (Central) and Gold Avenues. Van Tassel rose slowly in his City of Albuquerque balloon to an apex of 11,000 feet despite it being only 2/3 full of lifting gas. His safe landing near the fairgrounds near Central Avenue and Rio Grande Blvd. was hailed as a complete success.Albuquerque Daily Journal, July 6, 1882Albuquerque Evening Review, July 6, 1882
 
==National and International Balloon tours==
Van Tassel toured the American west, providing balloon ascensions at locations in UtahThe Salt Lake Herald, July 4, 1883, the northwest,Morning Oregonian, January 2, 1889 New OrleansTimes Picayune, March 20, 1884, CaliforniaSacramento Daily Record-Union, September 5, 1885. In Scientific American he suggested the possibility of a transcontinental balloon voyage across North America in 1886, something unheard of at the time."A Transcontinental Balloon Voyage" in Scientific American 54, 26, 401 (June 1886) doi:10.1038/scientificamerican06261886-401, https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/a-transcontinental-balloon-voyage/ Together with Thomas Scott Baldwin, Van Tassel co-invented a parachute, used by Baldwin to make the first parachute jump in the western United States on January 30, 1887 at San Francisco.Gary Fogel, Sky Rider: Park Van Tassel and the Rise of Ballooning in the West, University of New Mexico Press, Albuquerque, NM, 2021 In competition with other daredevils such as Baldwin, Percival G. Spencer, James Price, and others, he later toured the world with his Van Tassel Troupe, associated with balloon ascensions and parachute jumps. His troupe is credited with the first successful parachute jump in Hawaiihttps://evols.library.manoa.hawaii.edu/bitstream/10524/3747/1/1889112601.pdf, first balloon flights and parachute jumps by women in AustraliaSydney Morning Herald, December 23, 1889, early balloon flights in IndiaThe Times of India, February 26, 1891, the first flight in Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, and other locations in southeast Asia. Many of these events also helped to pioneer women's efforts in early aviation as a part of the Troupe.Bill Metcalf, Lady Parachutists and the End of Civilisation in Queensland, Queensland Review Vol. 13, No. 1, 2008, https://core.ac.uk/download/pdf/143852036.pdf
==California==
Van Tassel returned to the United States, living in the San Francisco Bay area and continuing his ballooning in Oakland. He briefly assisted in high-altitude glider flights arranged by John J. Montgomery near Santa Clara and helped establish balloon clubs such as the Pacific Aero Club and the Oakland Aero Club, making several recreational flights in his large City of Oakland balloon.Gary Fogel, Sky Rider: Park Van Tassel and the Rise of Ballooning in the West, University of New Mexico Press, Albuquerque, NM, 2021 He also patented a mechanical toy parachute in the 1921. 
==Family life==
Van Tassel married Elizabeth Spencer in 1872 at Indiana, divorced and married Ella Block in San Joaquin, California in 1879. In 1885 he divorced Block and married Clara A. Coykendall at San Jose, California. In 1888, Clara became the first woman to make a parachute jump in the western United States. Clara filed for divorce in 1890, and Van Tassel married Edith Ann Nowlan in 1892 in India. After returning to California in 1900 without Nowlan, Van Tassel married again in 1912 to A. F. Barr at Oakland. He passed away October 24, 1930 at Oakland following a heart attack.Gary Fogel, Sky Rider: Park Van Tassel and the Rise of Ballooning in the West, University of New Mexico Press, Albuquerque, NM, 2021
 
Category:1853 births
Category:1930 deaths
Category:Aviation inventors
Category:Aviation pioneers