In mid-January, 1910, the skies above Chattanooga were apparently a buzz with activity. For about a week people were seeing a mysterious airship floating over the city. There were reports of the craft, not only in Chattanooga, but as far away as Knoxville, Alabama and Arkansas. To some witnesses the gas filled bag looked as big as a house, while others saw it as long as a telephone pole. Still others reported it as being oblong shaped, ten feet across and fifty feet long some even claimed to hear the engines of the craft. Some would see it only move in a straight line, while other times it would seem to maneuver about. Sailing at 500 to 1000 feet up in the heavens, there could be seen a shape hanging from it that resembled an “aero plane” piloted by a man. There was much speculation about the vessel; it seemed to some folks that whoever was piloting the craft was taking note of local activity, spying for some nefarious purpose no doubt. In Alabama, the craft supposedly landed one night and resumed its activities the next morning. One gentleman even claimed to see the occupant expel some kind of gas for the purpose of turning the craft and entered a fog bank, not to be seen again that evening. Many witnesses would claim that the craft was under intelligent control, maneuvering here and there to get a better look at happenings on the ground. Many saw the operator of the craft sitting in the stern. Speculation over what the man was doing ranged from a local merchant looking for the Chamber of Commerce wanting to make a donation to a member of one of the political parties, trying to ascertain who knows what, to a sky pirate there to loot and pillage.
After about a week of this, a cigar shaped bag, about fifteen feet long and four feet wide would come to land gently in one of the neighborhoods of Chattanooga. The peculiar object was discovered by the locals and word of its whereabouts spread like wildfire. A crowd would gather around this object and it soon became apparent that what was spread out in front of them was the mysterious airship that had been plaguing the area. It turns out that a group of local tricksters had been sending the very small dirigible aloft and scaring the wits out of the community. The apparent ne’er-do-wells certainly got a good laugh.
This is an interesting study of how people’s powers of observation may not always be reliable, and how a sort of mass hysteria can affect how someone perceives an event or an object. Folks really thought they saw a man operating and searching the ground, and they just knew that this object was under intelligent control. Yet, it was just a big balloon, set aloft as a joke. Interesting indeed…
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