Balloon - Filling balloon on Wanamaker's - 1911 Ceramic Tree Decoration

Colourized photo from 1911 Original Title: Filling balloon on Wanamaker's Location: 82 Wanamaker Pl New York, NY 10003 Wanamaker's Department store, the second department store in the United States, the first store was also Wanamaker's the one he opened in Philadelphia. On July 9th 1911, The store held an advertising stunt. They would fly a balloon from their NY store to their Philly store. The hydrogen balloon was to lift off to take place at 11:30am, but due to a shift in the wind pattern, they delayed it till 5:43pm. After lift off, the balloon sored high up in the sky, when it was then lost in the clouds over the Hudson. For several hours they struggled to get the balloon under control, they dropped a considerable distance, and ended up landing in a field near Nyack NY at around 8:30pm. People were on the ground and were able to guide it in with the strings dangling from the balloon. While it didn't work the way they wanted, it worked just fine for advertising anyway. After than there was a lot of talk about people launching airships from rooftops and it would be a new mode of transportation. I guess it didn't work out that way.