The Aeronauts: Travels in the Air

by James Glaisher, Liz Bentley (Introduction)

In 1862, ambitious scientist James Glaisher set out to do the impossible: ascend higher into the skies than ever before to establish his groundbreaking research.

Glaisher's death-defying journey forms the story of the major motion picture The Aeronauts, starring Eddie Redmayne as Glaisher and Felicity Jones as his balloon companion, Amelia Wren. Written in his own words, The Aeronauts chronicles Glaisher's incredible flights and discoveries first hand, as well as his observations on the pioneers who came before and inspired him.

Includes an introduction by Professor Liz Bentley, Chief Executive at the Royal Meteorological Society, of which Glaisher was a founding member in 1850.

Genres: Nonfiction, History, Historical, Science, Audiobook

1 pages, Audio CD

First published January 1, 1871

About the author

James Glaisher FRS (7 April 1809 – 7 February 1903) was an English meteorologist and aeronaut.

Born in Rotherhithe, the son of a London watchmaker, Glaisher was a Junior assistant at the Cambridge Observatory from 1833 to 1835 before moving to the Royal Greenwich Observatories, where he served as Superintendent of the Department of Meteorology and Magnetism at Greenwich for thirty-four years.

In 1845, Glaisher published his dew point tables, for the measurement of humidity. He was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society in June 1849.

He was a founder member of the Meteorological Society (1850) and the Aeronautical Society of Great Britain (1866). He was president of the Royal Meteorological Society from 1867 to 1868.

He is most famous, however, as a pioneering balloonist. Between 1862 and 1866, usually with Henry Tracey Coxwell as his co-pilot, Glaisher made numerous ascents in order to measure the temperature and humidity of the atmosphere at its highest levels. His ascent on 5 September 1862 broke the world record for altitude, but he passed out around 8,800 metres before a reading could be taken. One of the pigeons making the trip with him died.[4] Estimates suggest that he rose to more than 9,500 metres and as much as 10,900 metres above sea-level.

Glaisher lived at 22 Dartmouth Hill, Blackheath, London, where there is a blue plaque in his memory. He died in Croydon, Surrey in 1903.

He had married in 1843 Cecilia Louisa, a daughter of Henry Belville, Assistant at the Royal Observatory, Greenwich. James and Cecilia Glaisher had three children, including the mathematician James Whitbread Lee Glaisher (1848–1928).

Reviews

[Tina Ambury · Rating 5 out of 5]

I was amused to read a 1 star review saying this reads "like a scientific log..."
No Shit Sherlock. It _is_ a scientific journal and science is beautiful.
Glaisher's descriptions of what he sees whilst airborne are poetic, powerful and beautiful.
Some of the cinematography of the film was stunning and this was easy to trace back to the book.

[Jc · Rating 5 out of 5]

All of the detail allows the reader to grasp the thought process of the the earliest explorers of the air. They did not know what to expect or what was important. What it revealed is immense curiosity and phenomenal courage.
Well worth the few hours to emerse oneself in the world of the 19th century.

[Fatima]

It doesn’t feel right to me to rate this because although I found it interesting to read I’m definitely not the audience for it, i was lost half of the time and kept getting confused by different kinds of measurements, so i will leave this to be rated by people into or studying meteorology.

[Cassie · Rating 4 out of 5]

These are the journal entries of a scientist from the 1800s exploring the sky and human limits in a hot air balloon. Not the most riveting or exciting book, but good, scientific, and true nonetheless.

[Pablo A · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book is good in the sense of what it is, or was rather, at its time of publication - a very detailed, technical if you will, account of scientific observations as recounted by Glaisher. I saw the Amazon movie before reading this book. This book is not the movie, but as I read it I saw the bits and pieces taken from this book that I saw in the movie. Granted, the movie credits it is based on Falling Upwards by Richard Holmes, but the real like person James Glaisher is who I wanted to read first. This is a quick read, if tedious on the data details it's still worthy in scope and visual descriptions. Imagine being one of few people to take to the air in the 1800s!! Gleisher's amazement is pure awe.

[Charles Pollard · Rating 2 out of 5]

Okay I won’t lie to you, this book was tough to get through. I have read some pretty dense books in the past but it felt like a crawl as I navigated the pages. If you are interested in Aeronauts I hope this book serves its purpose for you. An exiting tale of atmospheric discovery it was not. I decided to read it in preparation for the movie. Let’s hope the movie is better.

Update: watched the movie. It was better than the book though sadly not by much.

[Leah Angstman · Rating 2 out of 5]

The introduction and back-history is very interesting, but the individual facts, measurements, and statistics are extremely dry and tedious. Review coming soon in my Pedantic Literary Historian column at The Coil. Will cross-post.

[Meghan Chiasson · Rating 1 out of 5]

I always try to read a book before the movie comes out, and the previews for this movie looked amazing. That being said this book reads like an observatory log. The introduction went on forever and although some of the information was useful for people who do not study air pressure or weather, there was too much data and numbers that went right over my head. The movie should prove more interesting than the book.

[Shanereads · Rating 4 out of 5]

A great historical read! I wanted to read this before I watched the movie on Amazon Prime. Its a little dry, and written in language from the 1800's, but I enjoyed it.

[Matt]

I saw the West End musical Operation Mincemeat and absolutely loved it, so I read the original book it was based on, The Man Who Never Was. I really enjoyed that one because it was written by Ewan Montagu, who played a leading role in Operation Mincemeat itself. It added so much context that only enhanced my love of the musical.

I saw the Amazon film The Aeronauts and loved that too, so I picked up this book, written by one of the men who actually made the balloon flights. Unfortunately, I didn’t enjoy this one nearly as much as the film.

Nothing against the book itself - I’m sure meteorologists, weather enthusiasts, scientists, and even hot-air balloonists will find plenty to enjoy here. But for a layman like me, who was hoping for more of the action-adventure feel of the film, it was just a bit too scientific, too numbery, and too researchy for my taste.

For me personally, this was a one-star read. But I’m not actually going to rate it because I don’t want to bring down the book’s overall rating. Having finished it, I realize I’m simply not the target audience, and that’s perfectly okay.

[Sean · Rating 2 out of 5]

As this turned out to be mostly technical notes and scientific readings, collected during the early years of hot air ballooning, it did not make for a great audiobook. Hearing an emotionless narrator drone on about barometric readings and rates of ascent made for a listening experience not unlike the dial-up time/temperature services of my early years. Drab, dry, just the facts with occasional bouts of vague elaboration. My own lack of familiarity with British geography didn’t help matters. Maybe I’d have been more engaged if I knew just how close Crystal Palace is to the sea, and thus, how brief and panicked a flight might turn after a sudden change in wind direction. They can’t steer these things, you know.

There are a few brief narrative passages; real-life adventures that paint a funny picture of what bold, reckless times these were. I greatly enjoyed the opportunity to imagine a pair of refined Victorian gentlemen, drifting aimlessly through the clouds with only faith and a thatch basket separating their bodies from a graceless final plunge. Especially amusing is one early flight, in which the aeronauts set out to find the upper limits of human endurance. Here, our narrator gradually and purposefully ascends to 30,000 feet, where he promptly blacks out. Only a bit of last-minute heroics from his partner (both hands disabled by altitude, he grips the release cord with his teeth) saves them both from a sleepy demise. Times, and people, were a little different back then.

[Adelle · Rating 2 out of 5]

While this was very interesting, it was a little too 'scientific journal' for me.

I like learning about history - scientific history in particular - however, this was too focused on technical aspects with assumed knowledge. I'd have liked more detail then I got. I wasn't expecting a story - like the film (which I hadn't even seen the trailer for before reading this) - but I did think I would get a little bit more than the recordings of data in paragraph formats.

I think I was just looking for more exposition than I got, sadly.

Still, there were some parts that were quite interesting, but I definitely page counted.

[BookSmasher · Rating 2 out of 5]

Purchased because I wanted to read a first hand account of the adventure involved with the early aeronaut's job. However, the majority of the book goes over excruciating detail of the meteorological studies James Glaisher conducted. Which in all fairness, was his life and incredibly important work.

[Michael Brown · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very atmospheric, and quite eye opening. We don’t realise how much work and effort went into the discoveries we now take for granted. Different directions of the winds at different levels and so forth.

[Sharon Buxton · Rating 3 out of 5]

C. nonfiction, hot air balloons,basis for movie, meteorology, from stash, Joshua

[Valerie Kolbinger · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5

[Tom Stevens]

Pretty interesting as far as scientific journals go, but this is not the movie, folks.

[Kieran Nurmi · Rating 1 out of 5]

A dull and uninformative recount of trips in balloons. More background into the science, instruments and what exactly they were trying to accomplish would have improved it considerably.

[Angie · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5 stars

[Sara · Rating 2 out of 5]

I went into this knowing it was a travel log, but still did not find it interesting.

[S · Rating 2 out of 5]

Don’t let my 2-star review fool you, this book was Aero-NOT BORING at all!!!

[Thomas Bader]

It doesn’t seem fair to assign this a rating. It was informative and interesting. If you are expecting a narrative I would suggest spending your time with something else.

[Matt · Rating 3 out of 5]

It's more than a bit dry, but it's truly stunning and inspiring to read what the aeronauts did to expand the horizons of science.

[Ebook Reader · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great book, the e-book version can be found at:
https://www.kobo.com/us/en/ebook/trav...