The Smithsonian National Space and Air Museum remembered the first Channel crossing by air in a webpost titled ‘Crossing the Channel in a Balloon’. Tom Crouch explained that the arrival of pioneering French exhibition balloonist Jean-Pierre Blanchard (1753–1809) to England in 1784 sparked excitement over ballooning. Boston-born John Jeffries MD, an American loyalist living in England, supported Blanchard’s plan to fly across the English Channel. … Continue reading Channel Crossing by Air