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Thomas Monck Mason (1803–1889) was a flute player, writer, and balloonist. He wrote concerning his famous fabricated global balloon trip and on theology.


Biography

Monck Mason was born in 1803. He spent some years studying the flute abroad after he completed his formal education at Trinity College in Dublin. He composed a number of operatic works as well as being a professional flautist.Thomas Monck Mason
National Portrait Gallery, accessed May 2009
Monck Mason is shown in a painting preparing for a journey in a balloon with Charles Green and
Robert Hollond Robert Hollond (1808–1877) was an English balloonist, lawyer, and politician. He funded and then took part in establishing a distance ballooning record with Thomas Monck Mason and Charles Green. He later served as a Whig politician represen ...
. They travelled a record distance of 500 miles in 18 hours. In 1836, Thomas Monck Mason wrote an ''Account of the Late æronautical Expedition from London to Weilburg'' which detailed the journey. This book was dedicated to Hollond. Mason republished the book in an extended form in 1838 when it was titles, ''Aeronautica; Or, Sketches Illustrative of the Theory and Practice of Aerostation: Comprising an Enlarged Account of the Late Aerial Expedition to Germany''. The book contained illustrations of the balloon and its journey. The engravings were said to be based on sketches made by Mason. Mason describes the journey which took only eighteen hours and how after landing they started to return to England. He notes that it took several hours to procure fourteen helpers and a horse and cart. These were required to get the balloon to the nearest town of
Weilburg Weilburg is, with just under 13,000 inhabitants, the third biggest town in Limburg-Weilburg district in Hesse, Germany, after Limburg an der Lahn and Bad Camberg. Geography Location The community lies in the Lahn valley between the Westerwa ...
. Mason notes that the precise location where they landed was by a mil called Dillhausen in the valley of Elbern, two leagues from Weilburg. This is interesting as he says this is also the place where
Jean-Pierre Blanchard Jean-Pierre rançoisBlanchard (4 July 1753 – 7 March 1809) was a French inventor, best known as a pioneer of gas balloon flight, who distinguished himself in the conquest of the air in a balloon, in particular the first crossing of the Englis ...
landed in an earlier balloon trip when he set out from Frankfurt in 1785. Besides the painting and the book, the humorous poet
Thomas Hood Thomas Hood (23 May 1799 – 3 May 1845) was an English poet, author and humorist, best known for poems such as " The Bridge of Sighs" and "The Song of the Shirt". Hood wrote regularly for ''The London Magazine'', ''Athenaeum'', and ''Punch''. ...
also wrote a comic poem to celebrate the epic journey to
Nassau Nassau may refer to: Places Bahamas *Nassau, Bahamas, capital city of the Bahamas, on the island of New Providence Canada *Nassau District, renamed Home District, regional division in Upper Canada from 1788 to 1792 *Nassau Street (Winnipeg), ...
. The ''Ode to Messrs Green, Hollond and Monck on their late Balloon Adventure'', includes the following lines Write then Messrs Monck Mason Hollond Green ! And tell us all you have or haven t seen ! Twaa kind when the balloon went out of town To take Monck Mason up and set him down In the 1840s, Mason was impoverished having lost considerable funds after leasing the Opera House in
Covent Garden Covent Garden is a district in London, on the eastern fringes of the West End, between St Martin's Lane and Drury Lane. It is associated with the former fruit-and-vegetable market in the central square, now a popular shopping and tourist si ...
. The court case over the losses was to drag on for 23 years.


After the balloon trip

For over thirty years after 1845 Mason published books on theology. His first book argued for the infallibility of the bible. Mason's 1863 work ''The Work and the Word or The Dealings and Doctrines of God in relation to the State and Salvation of Man summarily Reviewed Reconciled and Recommended in accordance with the dictates of Human Reason'' was described as ''ingeniously contrived'', but ''theoretically theological''. Mason died in 1889.


In fiction

Mason's book on the balloon trip was the model for a famous hoax told by
Edgar Allan Poe Edgar Allan Poe (; Edgar Poe; January 19, 1809 – October 7, 1849) was an American writer, poet, editor, and literary critic. Poe is best known for his poetry and short stories, particularly his tales of mystery and the macabre. He is wide ...
. He published accounts of a man called ''Monck Mason'' who had just crossed the Atlantic by balloon in three days. The character of Monck Mason was not a real person, though he was based heavily on Thomas Monck Mason; the story borrowed heavily from Mason's 1836 book ''Account of the Late Aeronautical Expedition from London to Weilburg''.


References


External links

Monck Mason (1838
''Aeronautica; or, sketches illustrative of the theory and practice of aerostation''
- digital facsimile from
Linda Hall Library The Linda Hall Library is a privately endowed American library of science, engineering and technology located in Kansas City, Missouri, sitting "majestically on a urban arboretum." It is the "largest independently funded public library of scien ...
{{DEFAULTSORT:Mason, Thomas Monck 1803 births 1889 deaths Alumni of Trinity College Dublin