On Balloons and Brick Walls…

As per various recent posts here, I’ve been trying to find out about a 1947 US experimental military balloon accident, as recounted by Duke Gildenberg in Craig Ryan’s “The Pre-Astronauts” (pp. 20-21). Back then, it seems to me that the only manned experimental balloon was the one being built for the Office of Naval Research’s Project Helios using a cluster of polyethylene balloons, as designed by Jean Felix Piccard. If I’m right, this would date the accident to between June 1947 (which is when General Mills had 500lb of polyethylene film ready to make into balloons) and mid-September 1947 (when Project Helios was finally shut down).

However…

• Craig Ryan had nothing extra to add when I asked him about this incident
• When I asked NARA, it holds archives on Project Helios’ successors (1948+), but nothing on Helios
• Commander George W. Hoover never published his tell-all memoirs on the early years of the ONR
  • I haven’t yet had a reply from his son George W. Hoover II, though still remain hopeful

I also contacted Sheryl K. Hill (whose excellent dissertation on Jeannette Ridlon Piccard I mentioned previously) about the Piccard Family Papers at the LoC (to which she referred extensively). The Piccard letters she quoted show that the Navy replaced Jeannette Piccard with highly experienced balloonist Lt Harris F. Smith USNR as pilot for Project Helios. However, I haven’t yet had a reply from Hill.

J. Gordon Vaeth’s “They Sailed The Skies” further added that Lt. Harris F. Smith was then, amidst yet more US Navy mid-1947 political chicanery, replaced by a different (and far less distinguished, balloon-wise) US Navy Commander, though this commander’s name was not recorded. Given that this commander might well have been the balloon pilot who had the accident, I put some effort into trying to work out who he was…

Navy Balloonists

At this point, Mark Lutz at the Lighter Than Air Society kindly came to my (partial) rescue here, with a list the LTAS maintains of Navy LTA aviators up to 1945. But cross-checking its list against the US Navy lists in Ancestry highlighted two problems with my search. Firstly, Navy ranks can be hard to pin down – specifically, there was a difference between permanent rank and acting rank, where many acting ranks seem to have been inflated in late 1945. (I suspect this was to do with military pensions.) And secondly, even though I was able to find the US Navy Officers List for 1st July 1947, I haven’t yet found the equivalent list for the Naval Reserve. So, for example, I was unable to find Lt. Harris F. Smith (because he was USNR).

All the same, by looking for Captains and Commanders who had the LTA Aviator qualification (‘3’) in the July 1947 US Navy Officers List, I managed to compile two decent-sized lists of names (23 and 33 entries respectively) and dates of birth. Looking these up in familysearch.org yielded dates of decease for all but George William Campbell (b. 15th Jul 1902).

Of all the rest, the most interesting by far was Captain Charles Hansford Kendall (b. 17th July 1904, d. 27th Aug 1949). He was a pre-WWII US Navy balloonist (who competed in Gordon Bennett races): his name pops up in J. Gordon Vaeth’s “They Sailed The Skies” (pp. 102-104). His ballooninghistory.com entry reads (‘B’ means ‘Balloon’):

• b: 17 Jul.1904 Baltimore, MD.
• e: U.S.Naval Academy, 1928.
• s: Officer in the U.S.Navy; Balloon & Airship Instructor; Lt.Commander, Commander of Airship Squadron ZP12 in 1941; Executive Officer of USS-Shaw, 1943;
• f: Received B-Training at Lakehurst Naval Air Station; FAI-ACA B-License #1083 issued 27 Jul.1934; More than 1525 LTA hours by 1933; Last LTA duty 1944.
• l: 1933, Aide (to T.SETTLE) in G-Bennett B-Race; 1934, Winner of U.S.National B-Races; 1934, Placed 12th in G-Bennett B-Race.
• r: Who’s Who in Aviation 1942-43; The Airship 29 Dec.1943 p3.

“The Carters of Blenheim” (1955) offers a little more information about him:

During World War II as a Lt. Commander [he] commanded a destroyer in the Pacific Area and after the war was returned to Lakehurst, New Jersey, and attained the grade of Captain in the U.S. Navy. He died August 26, 1949. On July 16, 1938, he married Boudinot Atterbury Oberge.

It goes on to say that Kendall had two sons: Charles Hansford Kendall (b. 13 Jun 1939) and John Kendall (b. 29 Jan 1943).

Perhaps I’m wrong, but I can’t help but think that Kendall seems to fit the description I’m looking for – a high-ranking Navy commander with extraordinarily deep ballooning and LTA piloting experience, but yet who never really got the ballooning ‘brand recognition’ (say) Tex Settle did.

Is Kendall the US Navy Balloonist I’m Looking For?

TL;DR – maybe he is, maybe he ain’t.

Regardless, I’d be very interested to see his obituary, and there also seems to be a six page US Navy biography of him (I’ve asked the Navy Archives if I can see the portion covering 1946-1949), which may well cast some light on this.

The best possible historical source would seem to be Commander George W. Hoover’s (unpublished) memoirs, but… hoping for that seems to be hoping for too much. Oh well!