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Living Through,Ones Art

NOVEMBER 16, 2011
Amazing got a flight in the V-Bee on a recent Friday morning. The dam thing took off like a bat out of hell, straight up. I had to fight the stick for the entire sixteen minute trip, the machine wanted to barrel roll on me. It finally leveled off over Miller Field at about one hundred and two miles an hour, at about three quarters of the throttle. Did one loop to Bay Terrace I think I nicked a cloths line was a bit to low. The altitude gauge was reading about two hundred and twenty feet, way to low for a surban area. Landed with a thud on the strip near the water made a heck of a lot of a lot of noise. Some women called the police but we had the machine packed and away by car well before any one arrived, amazing.

I travel around with the scluptures to many towns on my little island looking for good locations to shoot.The places I discover are often just as amazing as the shoot is fun.

Autumns Journey,shot on the deck of a sixty year old barge note the iron bolts

This is what appeared to be old company housing located not far from the docks where I was shooting

“The Robinson Caruso” of early flight Little is know of this some what obscure inventor a native New Yorker who lived for a short time on the shore line of early Staten Island. The son of a railroad boss, John Bellows earned his trade as a boilermaker for the now closed former B&O railroad. In 1898 he began to test his all metal steel skinned flying zeppelins designs on the shores of what is now called the southern bay. He was obsessed with compressed air mixed with helium; a volatile mix that he then combined with steam that he generated in large amounts with his hand fabricated portable boilers. A quiet man known only vaguely to the neighbors, who were in short supply during this early time as the island was scarily populated. Little else is known about John Bellows other that he was somewhat eccentric inventor tinker who passed away in his early fifties of pneumonia. Reports vary as to his actual results; some claim he did in fact make several unconfirmed flights .One account reports a strange cigar like shape was spotted hovering in the skies over Old Bridge New Jersey. But there are no actual documents to support these sightings. He passed away as a somewhat obscure and colorful local legend.

Night flight of the “Tin Zeppelin” Kansas City 1899 A now famous print of this Kansas City test flight of the John Bellows Zeppelin fondly nicked named the “Tin Zeppelin”. Brought out west by locomotive in 1899 to take part in the Industrial Symposium held there during that year. She rose into the night sky with just a small hiss as the steam values were slowly opened. This print depicts the midnight flight that lasted a little over forty-five minutes and covered over ten miles of rural Kansas farmland. This test proved beyond a doubt that steam mechanical flight was possible. This air ship used a combination of compressed air, steam, and helium the steam was started off ship in a field boiler prior to lift off. Later models did not need the field boiler to start their eternal boilers.

This is a model of the Zeppelin in my office along with my great grandfather

All metal body thirties racer,

Working from memories memories of early child hood, where anything you wanted could be found in the back of comic books, from rocket ships to sea monkeys and all for two dollars amazing

Commander Codey’s Ray Gun (personal side arm) Few might remember Commander Cody and the lost planet airman but I do. Black and white short film serials released by Republic studios in the forties. Fighting bad guys and bug eyed Martians as well as the ability to fly via his personal jet-pack.

© 2024 Chris Spollen