This is one of those stories that made me chuckle. It is regarding a balloon flight over Paris in October 1878 when a lady, one of the passengers, in “an interesting condition”, gave birth and then tipped a doctor who just happened to be on board!
Here is the editorial from The Illustrated Police News – Saturday 02 November 1878:
“The Paris papers record one of the most remarkable births of modern times, and most of our readers will no doubt agree with us that it is more remarkable that a lady in such a condition should elect to leave terra firma.
It appears that just as the balloon at Paris had risen on about a quarter of a mile, on Monday last week, one of its occupants (a lady in an interesting condition) began to kick and scream. As a natural consequence there was a general consternation among the occupants of the car. A doctor who happened to be present saw that the lady was very near her confinement: so near, indeed, that moved all male passengers aside, bade the men anchor at the balloon mid air, and then a bouncing boy bounced into the world, under most exceptional circumstances, for this child can now share with the angels the privilege of being heaven born.
When all had been brought to a satisfactory conclusion the balloon descended, and the lady was carried to a carriage that bore her to her hotel, where we heard that the mother and child were (says a contemporary) doing well.
The lady is an Englishwoman, wife of a Manchester merchant, who handed the doctor, on alighting from the car, 500 franc note as a requital for his aerial obstetrics”.
I wonder who the Manchester lady was? But also, I wonder if this story is actually true!
