Helene Rogers

Fledgling balloonists in nineteenth-century Australia realised that their aerial endeavours added little to their pockets, or to science. Re-inventing themselves as showmen and women, they performed daring acrobatics from trapezes and parachutes, touring towns and cities all over the country. Along the way, they faced primitive and challenging conditions; experienced petty squabbles and farcical incidents; aeronauts blown out to sea,...