1830s: May 2009 Archives

Brig. General Herman Haupt

I enjoyed the talk on the Pennsylvania Railroad and the Civil War given recently by Ivan E. Frantz, Jr. at the York Civil War Round Table. I was especially impressed by Brig. General Herman Haupt and his fantastic engineering of railroad bridges and the speedy repairs his men made to the bridges destroyed by the Confederate invaders of York County.

Wondering, as always, if he had any other York County area connections, I did a little searching. Turns out, he certainly did.

Cut from James Mills' Eye-catching Ad.

The answer for Final Jeopardy this evening concerned two American presidents who witnessed the first balloon ascension in Paris and then, about ten years later, in 1793, the first American balloon ascension in Philadelphia. (Do-dee-do-dee.... Who were Jefferson and Adams?)

Watching balloon ascensions soon became a hugely popular spectator across America, including York, as you can see in my York Sunday News column below on Mr. Mills, his balloon, his excursions and his fate.