Customer Reviews

The Great Dirigibles

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Toland is one of America's great narrative historians. His book The Great Dirigibles, Their Triumphs and Disasters (formerly titled ships in the sky, The story of the Great Dirigibles)is sure to please even the most knowledgeable airship reader. Toland investigates the origins of airships and includes many of the pre-Zeppelin era narratives. The book is full of first hand accounts and includes an excellent index and an acknowledgement section (which will be of interest to serious readers). The strength of the book lies in the fact that it is not another re-telling of the Hindenburg disaster. The Norge, the Italia, the Shenandoah and other airships get equal treatment. There are also over two dozen pictures with captions. This is an easy to read book that will thrill the novice and please the serious studentsof airship history.

This is the first book I have ever come across that painstakingly details the demise of airships. Toland has recreated conversations and personal details from countless sources and testimony. Each accident and triumph is covered in detail. I loved this book. It is a must-read for any airship enthusiast.

Most books on airships are written by specialists, experts, or those who had a part in the development of the great dirigibles. John Toland is a interesting exception, an extreamly accomplished author who turned his attention to the subject. This book is a re-titled (and only very slightly re-edited) version of his book 'Ships in the Sky' from the fifties. Due to the original publication date, he was able to interview many of the principle figures in the stories, most of which took place in the twenties and early thirties. Most everyone is familiar with the Hindenburg disaster of 1937, but this book will introduce them to many other facinating accounts. He covers the R101 disaster, which was the British avaiation equivalent to the Titanic. Also included is a excellent account of the Italian 'Italia' drama at the North Pole (get Wilber Cross's 'Disaster at the Pole' if who want a book entirely dedicated to that event). Also covered is the United States Shennendoah, Akron and Macon crashes. Perhaps the highlight is a minute by minute (more like second by second) account of the Hindenburg crash.

John Toland's dated but compelling history tells the story of Zeppelins and dirigibles during the early 20th Century by retelling several moments of triumph and disaster, from the experiments of Solomon Andrews in 1865 to the crash of the Hindenburg in 1937. The narratives stick closely to the source material and provides only descriptions and dialogue gleaned from interviews and eyewitness accounts. The book's age is apparent through its stylistic quirks, such as Toland's annoying tendency to refer to the few women in the book by the names of their husbands. These complaints aside, "The Great Dirigibles" successfully evokes both the romance and danger of lighter than air ships during the early age of flight.

A well written account of what went right and what went wrong with the great airships. As more went wrong than went right,it is mostly an account of the disasters. The chapter on the Italia and Gen. Nobile was long and a little tedious as it was more an account of how they survived after crashing their airship in the arctic than about the airship that took them there.

This is one of a relatively few books covering the aviation history of the dirigible, or rigid airship. In the last century it was pioneered by the Germans, then experimented with by other nations. It ended with the Germans as well when the Hindenburg exploded in front of newsreel cameras. Most books look only at the Hindenburg disaster, ignoring the crashes of the R101, Akron, Shenandoah and others. Toland tells the story of them all, including accounts of ten disasters. It will soon become clear to any reader that the airship had more 'tragedy' than 'triumph' of course. It is a wonder they lasted as long as they did.

The only fault I found with this book is that Toland devotes all his efforts to telling individual stories. These are necessary and interesting, but more attention could have been given to other aspects of the matter, such as parallel aviation developments or political events.

Perhaps you have never heard of Dr. Solomon Andrews of Perth Amboy, New Jersey, who occupies the first chapter of John Toland's "The Great Dirigibles." Andrews claimed to have invented an Aereon balloon that could be flown into the wind, thanks to taking the advantage of the "differences in specific gravity" between the Aereon and the air.

Yeah, right. News reports from the 1860s claimed that Andrews flew his ship in figure eights and against the wind over Manhattan. Only John Toland, who later in life proved himself to be a perfect gull over fanciful claims about the attack on Pearl Harbor, and -- this is a group I had not known existed before reading this book and doing a little side exploration -- a body of kooks devoted to the history of occult flying machines in the Gilded Age believe this.

Ah, well, as a belief it is no sillier than chiropractic and a lot less dangerous to your well-being.

The remainder of this book is unsatisfactory though not as crazy.

Hydrogen has gotten a bad rap in connection with dirigibles, because of the fiery crash of the Hindenburg in 1937, the first time a transportation disaster had been captured on newsreels. But while a big bag of hydrogen is undoubtedly dangerous, hydrogen explosions were not what brought down most dirigibles. Almost all the United States Navy's big airships crashed, and they didn't use hydrogen.

You might suppose that a book subtitled "Disasters" of dirigibles would explore the underlying cause of all these disasters. Not here. "The Great Dirigibles" was originally published in 1957, the 20th anniversary of the end of the dirigible, but it is not a mere catchpenny tract culled from old newspaper files.

Toland, a trained (although not very competent) historian, interviewed scores of participants in the dirigible madness and examined a thick pile of documents. And produced something not very much better than a mere catchpenny tract, although written with some style.

Toland later became a famous historian, as nice an example as one could wish to find of the triumph of style over substance.

His book is one of personalities, without taking much interest in the technique of something that its promoters claimed was a -- sometimes, the -- technological marvel of the age. The personalities are sometimes vivid, although Santos-Dumont, who is still imagined to be the inventor of the airplane by many Europeans, comes over as an insipid character. He invented an actual dirigible but could not think of any better purpose to use it for than to make showy entrances to Parisian cafes.

The most attractive character in the book is Umberto Nobile. Italians are not usually thought of as dirigible masters, but Nobile was extremely successful, the first and last man to fly a dog over the North Pole in a balloon twice. He was victimized by the Fascists, and his adventures take up more pages than anyone else, even Count Zeppelin.

Since most of the book is made up of escapes -- the dead tell no tales -- "The Great Dirigibles" makes a good read if you like that sort of thing. Unlike contemporaries, Toland does not shy away from sordid behavior, like the looting of the corpses of American flyers by the salt-of-the-earth Ohio farmers when the Shenandoah crashed.

But, except by implication, you will not find out why these big beasts went down. The inherent problem of the rigid dirigible is that its light (duh) structure cannot withstand racking forces. The semirigids (as designed by Nobile) were somewhat more rugged and the blimps, with no structure to rack, were and are safe.

Informative look beyond just the Hindenburg of the many voyages and tragedies experienced in air travel of this type. The book was originally published in 1957 and then reprinted in 1972 and during this time, many new theories have developed that explain why certain events took place. Although slightly out of date on technology explanations, the material and stories are worth reading.

Good book high in personal details, but lacking in technical insight, basicly describes, a series of airship disasters from individuals personal point of view. Good general reading but not if you want to understand the reasons behind the headlines.