Hard to believe, but one-hundred years ago the future of air travel was thought to be found in what was known as the “Airship’, the fancy word for clumsy word ‘Dirigible’. We now know these bizarre aeronautical devices as ‘blimps’ and what we know of them is usually confined to two things; the Goodyear Blimp and the Hindenburg. But there’s much more to the story of the ‘rise and fall’ (literally) of the Dirigible. Passenger airplanes of the 1930s quickly outpaced the floating behemoths and they were a thing of the past–at least in terms of long-distance air travel–in short order. And the disaster of the Hindenburg was a public relations nightmare that the industry never recovered from. Which leads me to the strange little piece of film I’ve posted above. It’s from a British-Pathe newsreel from 1920. They refer to the appearance of the blimp as a “pleasant spectacle for Paris’ and call it a ‘surrendered German airship’, which implies some World War 1 activity that the ship took part in. At one point a little airplane circles around the airship. We see the Eiffel Tower in the background. A few shots of the little airplane on the ground follow and that’s about it. What was the purpose of this little event? Why was it news? Who was doing the flying? Why did they film it? Why? Why? Why? I don’t know but I’m mesmerized by this ghostly piece of silent footage. It’s attracted a measly 394 views in its eleven years on YouTube. Let’s show it–and for that matter the forlorn Dirigible–a little love and give it a watch…