Aerial theatre

Pearson's Weekly (London), 28 January 1909, 615
1900s, Aerial theatre, Air defence, Art, Periodicals, Pictures

The Invasion of 1909 — II

In September 1909, rather late in Invasion‘s run, an article appeared in Pearson’s Weekly explaining not only some of the pyrotechnical mechanics behind the spectacle, but also the underlying airpower theory. Because it was not merely an popular entertainment and a commercial one at that, but a response to the question ‘Invasion by aeroplane, is

Illustrated London News, 12 June 1909, 7
1900s, Aerial theatre, Periodicals, Pictures

The Invasion of 1909 — I

This photo, according to the Illustrated London News, shows ‘THE FIRST SHELL DISCHARGED FROM AN AEROPLANE OVER ENGLAND’.((Illustrated London News, 12 June 1909, 7. Another version of the same photo appears in Daily Mirror (London), 5 June 1909, 4.)) But it doesn’t really, because the ‘aeroplane’ almost certaintly wasn’t real but a non-flying mock-up strung

Aviation in the Literature anMichael McCluskey and Luke Seaber (eds), Culture of Interwar Britain
1910s, 1920s, 1930s, Aerial theatre, Books, Civil defence, Pictures, Publications

Publication: ‘Spectre and spectacle’

I’ve got a chapter entitled ‘Spectre and spectacle: mock air raids as aerial theatre in interwar Britain’ in a new Palgrave Macmillan collection just out, Aviation in the Literature and Culture of Interwar Britain, edited by Michael McCluskey and Luke Seaber. Here’s the abstract: This chapter argues that aerial theatre, in the form of annual

Scroll to Top