JF Ptak Science Books   Quick Post

I think that there must have been a certain satisfaction for Mr. R.L. Downton when he had the idea for hydrogen-filled propellers–I mean, they must have made a lot of sense to him, sitting there in the Abbey, pondering the elegances of flight, while letting Maggie Smith walk away with all of the best lines.  Well, I’m kidding of course about Maggie Smith and the Downton Abbey remark, but I can well imagine Mr. Downton feeling as though he came to some sort of breakthrough by making the propellers for his flying machine its lifting device as well.  We can see in the first image that the “aerial ship” has side-by-side propellers and is driven by steam–the airship is still a little too refined and relatively light to fall into a classic “Steampunk” mold. 

The second drawing shows a modification to the somewhat-large ship above, with the airship being a flying gondola, with the hydrogen-filled propeller being hand-cranked.  It wasn’t a great idea by any means, but it was very interesting, at least to me.