If Mosquito Hawks Can Fly

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You'd see a unique design representing any given state. For example, on the back of the Massachusetts Quarter, you'd have a minute man. The Virginia Quarter featured ships arriving at Jamestown in 1607. And on the back of the North Carolina Quarter, you had a man lying prostrate on a primitive airplane, with another man watching from below.

This of course was a depiction of the Wright Brothers, and there are inaugural flight at the small beach town of Kitty Hawk.

At the top of the coin is the inscription "First Flight".

This is a story that virtually all Americans know. The Wright Brothers were the first to fly. The Wright Brothers invented the airplane. Or at the very least, the Wright Brothers were pioneers in the field of aviation. But there's another story you probably haven't heard that makes the origins of American aviation a little more complex.

I'm Lloyd Lockridge. In this, it's family lore. This story begins in Louisiana, a state not known for aviation. Quite the opposite, really. With its bayous, swamps, labyrinthine, coastline, and the nation's biggest river,

the state is known for its boats. Cajun P. Rogues, flat bottom air boats, paddle steamers, the Higgins boat. But the Louisiana man at the center of this episode's family lore was not interested in boats. He was not interested in navigating the water. Before the advent of airplanes, this man dreamed of navigating the sky.

His name was Charles Frederick Page. And to hear his story, we have traveled to Alexandria, Louisiana, and person to speak with one of his descendants. Charles Frederick Page's grandson.

“So let's just get started. Could you tell me your name please?”

Joseph P. Page. Joseph Page is 87 years old. He's a veteran of the United States Air Force and his military background shows. His house is tidier than a nuclear submarine. And Mr. Page stands with a certain posture, one that conveys not only physical strength,

but a kind of strength of character. He's the kind of person who, without saying a word, makes you want to take your hat off when you walk inside. We were greeted by him in his wife of 65 years. We sat down in his living room, and immediately launched into a conversation about his early life. Product grew up on hybrid tornadoes in Pineville, so we lived in a country, and about a hundred yards away.

Joseph came of age in 1950s, Louisiana, an overtly and unapologetically racist environment. Despite living in Pineville, he had to commute across the Red River to Alexandria in order to attend the only all black school in the area.

And to add insult to injury, even if he were the first person at the municipal bus stop,

he'd have to wait for all the white passengers to board first, only to pass them all on his way to the back of the bus. And dignities like that were a part of daily life. And this kind of blatant discrimination was a confusing experience for young Joseph Page. Because his neighbors out in the country were white, and he played with his neighbors all the time. But if they saw each other in the town of Alexandria, they'd have to pretend like they didn't know each other.

I didn't quite understand it as a child. In my mind, I knew it was not right as to why we could be friends and hang out together in the country where nobody was around. But we could not associate with each other when we were in Alexandria.

“And as a child, you remember thinking, this doesn't make any sense.”

Yeah, I did something wrong. I couldn't have got to put my hands on it. But by the time I got out of junior high school, I knew for a fact it was wrong. And I recognized it as discrimination. Joseph was grappling with these issues in the midst of a national reckoning.

The Civil Rights Act of 1964 was on the horizon, and the movement for racially quality was gaining momentum. But Joseph had no illusions about the reality of his situation.

To achieve the same results. And this was not some abstract lesson.

“It was inextricably connected to the story of the family's patriarch, Joseph's grandfather, Charles Frederick page.”

Charles page was born in 1864 in Rapide's Parish, Louisiana. He was born into slavery. Which means that Joseph pages grandfather, not as great great grandfather or some distant relative. But his grandfather was, at one point, enslaved. I shed, as to what my grandchildren are now.

To underscore the point of slavery was not that long ago. Think about that. Tell me one of the first things you remember learning about your grandfather, Charles Frederick page. Well, my parents and my aunt and uncles always talked about it. When I was a small kid, he was a bigger than life figure in my mind as a kid.

They always told us about maintaining in the first leadership.

In case he didn't catch that, Joseph said that he was always told that his grandfather invented the first airship. Hey, we would go as school kids would do. We would go to school in elementary school and say, "My grandfather built the first airship." And the other kids would laugh at us and say, "You know that's not right."

“So as a kid, you don't want to be embarrassed by your friends, right?”

So just stop talking about it. This claim that Charles Frederick page invented an airship prior to the right brothers inventing the air plane. This was a strong piece of page family lore. It's something the family believes to be true. But a lot of people outside the family are skeptical, at best.

Those who new Charles page respected him, but for other reasons. He was a Renaissance man. He was a timberman, a cobbler, a botanical farmer. He established a cemetery for the black community in Pineville. The first of its kind, the Lincoln cemetery.

He had a vision for diversified farming where a tenant farmer could slowly gain equity in the land he was working. But what a lot of his peers didn't know is that he also had a mind for engineering. He would have been a great engineer. The grand mother used to complain about, once he was a tall background father.

“He had a chicken coop. He needed to build a new chicken coop.”

He would get out from ruler, pencil, paper, and he would designate it. He would do all the stuff with it. All he needed is a simple chicken coop. It did not have to be like perfect, you know. But Charles page had bigger ambitions than stayed at the art chicken coop.

In one evening, while sitting on his porch, he got an idea from an unlikely contributor, the mosquito hawk. Those big, gangly, slow-moving mosquito-looking insects that you tend to see in the spring and fall. The store I heard repeated it was that it was sitting on his porch in the evenings and watched the flight of those mosquito hawks.

And that inspired him to figure out how he could duplicate that and fly himself and figure out how to do that. And in the ensuing weeks, months or even years, nobody knows for sure. Charles page worked on a way to fly. And he had a deadline.

He needed to design and build something in time for the 1904, Louisiana Purchase Exposition, which was held in St. Louis, Missouri. You might not have heard of this event before, but it was a huge deal. The exposition lasted seven months. It dominated the newspapers. It doubled as the location of the 1904 Olympics.

It saw 19 million visitors who feasted their eyes in the most cutting-edge inventions from around the world. And there were competitions for various categories. For example, the person with the greatest achievement aviation would walk away with a $100,000 prize about 3.5 million in today's money.

The page family has always maintained that prior to the Louisiana Purchase Exposition of 1904,

Charles completed designs of his airship. But that's not all. They say he also used his self-taught construction and engineering skills to build a workable, full-size airship. The page family doesn't know how long it took Charles page to build the ship, or how exactly he procured all the necessary materials.

But, according to the family, the vessel was built. And after it was built, Charles page signed up for the Louisiana Purchase Exposition, and made arrangements to transport the ship. In those days, the fastest way of getting something that big to a city 600 miles away was to put it on a freight train.

Obviously, he could not ride on a freight train with the ship. So he had to put on a train thinking that it would arrive in St. Louis and at some point he would arrive there. But after parting ways with his airship,

he got word that it never arrived in St. Louis.

All he was told is that his invention was not received at its destination.

“Why didn't it arrive inside Louis? What happened to it?”

And of course, Butler says it was Ross. How can you lose something that big? I was not like a matchbox. You know, this is a full-scale model that he built to put on that train. So how do you lose something that big?

You get on and speculate that he was stolen or destroyed. Or it was taken by somebody and examine for his mechanical engineering configurations. Whether the ship was stolen, destroyed, or somehow spontaneously flew off into the sunset

on its own, the invention was never seen again.

And according to his descendants, Charles Page never built another one. We're not sure why. Perhaps he wanted to, but couldn't dedicate the time and resources while trying to support 11 kids. It's been either airplane with a side gate.

His main focus to take over his family with a temperament and a form. He was a good enough temperament to look at a tree and determine how many feet of lumber they would get out of that tree. In an addition to being a temperament, Page was remembered by his friends and family as a community leader. In 1911, there were threats of race riots when a black man murdered a white man in Pineville.

Charles Page helped lead a meeting to unite the community, expressing deep regret for the death of the victim, condemning all violence, and pledging to bring the guilty party to justice. And thanks to Charles Page, cooler had prevailed. His daughter Eva once said in an interview,

"He always thought people were more important than airships."

Charles Page passed away in 1937 at 73 years old. His obituary describes him as a deep thinker, who had many visions which he attempted to put into execution. But the extent of those visions was known to very few outside the page family and the black community in Alexandria and Pineville.

By and large, his contributions to aviation were not recognized. And many who were aware of the story simply didn't believe it. Over the years, Joseph Page and his family have tried to raise awareness. But at some point, if people don't believe you and you don't have much in the way of hard proof, what more can you do.

Well, there in Alexandria, just a few miles away from Joseph's home, was a local history buff, who specialized in setting the record straight.

In this guy, had just stumbled upon an old forgotten article about someone he'd never heard of.

So I looked at this story. It starts talking about him exhibiting at the Louisiana Purchase World's Fair in St. Louis or attempting to and patenting an airplane. I said, "Oh my God!" We always recommend Shopify.

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It is not hard to destroy a college. Last season, the podcast Campus Files brought you stories of fraternity drug rings, stolen body parts, Campus Colts, and more. And now, Campus Files is back for another season. There's a guy screaming into his phone.

He's like, "Just try the cork you assassinate it right in front of me." Every week is a new episode and a new story. It's okay, I like it's almost a university on a siege. Listen to and follow Campus Files, available now wherever you get your podcasts. Easily my favorite part about this job is traveling to unfamiliar places and talking to strangers.

Even if the interview doesn't go well, and some of them haven't, trust me. As it turns out, cops don't love it when you ask them a thousand questions about why they couldn't solve for murder. But one thing I've learned over the years is if the person you're talking to walks out of their house to greet you, rather than waiting for you to come to the door, it means the interview is going to go just fine.

“And that's how we were greeted by Michael Wynn.”

My name is Michael Wynn, and I guess these days, I'm the unofficially historian for Central Louisiana. After a long career in law enforcement, Michael spends most of his free time researching local history. But as passion for recording history didn't start with Central Louisiana. As a teenager, Michael developed an obsession with interviewing older relatives.

I don't know, they didn't do anything."

“I say, "It's because you don't know anything about your history."”

Everybody has a story. No matter what you think, everybody has a story if you're willing to listen to them. And I came up with what I felt with perfect history books on my family, and I'm very, very proud of them. But then after I published them, I realized what's next. So Michael decided to just zoom out a tad.

He'd recorded his family history, now how about his community's history. He was under the impression at the time that the history of Central Louisiana was pretty well written. But still, he decided to take a look. And I remember reading in the Chamber of Commerce magazine that had this "Did you know section?" And one of the things in the "Did you know section" was John Wesley Harden,

the West greatest criminal was housed in the Alexandria City jail.

Well, what was he in jail for? So Michael did a little research. He called a John Wesley Harden biographer out in California, who had written several books on the guy, and asked him if he knew why Harden was arrested in Alexandria, Louisiana. He starts laughing at me.

He was never in that Louisiana. I know almost his day-to-day movement.

“He was never Louisiana, what the hell do y'all have over there?”

And I realized, the first story I hit that I wanted to write more about, I'm debunking. And so Michael's first encounter with Central Louisiana history sort of recalibrated his mission. He wasn't really writing Central Louisiana history. He was correcting it, so Michael kept digging in the local archives, looking for other peculiar stories. And I see this mention in 1906, an interview with a black man.

Now, let me back up a little bit. African Americans have always been treated poorly, were particularly treated poorly back then, and were particularly treated poorly in Central Louisiana.

I have basically never seen an interview before 1920s with an African American in the newspaper in Central Louisiana.

It's all white. You'd never know there was a black person in Pineville. This 1906 article was published in the Alexandria Town Talk. It was about a Pineville resident named Charles Frederick Page.

“Michael, a man who's been years interviewing people in Central Louisiana, had never heard of him.”

The headline reads, "Pineville Colored Man has invented an airship." It goes on to say that Charles Page made an application for a patent, and that it was granted to him by the federal government, April 1906. His Michael read the article he wondered, "How have I never heard of this?" I searched my library through history books and everything,

and other sources, references, vertical files, not a damn word on this man. So Michael began digging through records, pieography of Charles Frederick Page, and trying to figure out what the deal was with a so-called airship. Charles Page was in fact born into slavery. He grew up in Pineville and received no formal education.

But he was able to teach himself to reading right, and decipher as they used to say in the old day which is arithmetic. Michael then tracked down various other details, including a 1974 interview with Charles Page's daughter, Eva Page. And at some point in 1890s, according to his daughter Eva, he was looking up in a mosquito hawk one day and said,

"Corting to her, if a mosquito hawk can fly, I can fly." Now, here is a poor man working a farm with a gigantic family in a very depressive community. And he decides he wants to build himself, an airship, something that did not exist.

And here is his man saying, "I'm going to do it." Eva Page also had the original patent papers, including the approved design for the airship, which have since been scanned and shared with us. The design drawings for this airship are truly a magical sight.

It looks like something out of the imaginary of Dr. Parnassus or Peter Pan or something. The whole of the ship is made out of wire, with an oiled canvas stretched over the wire like a drum. Then bursting out of the ship are two enormous balloons or gas bags, which are powered by an intricate system of pumps, valves, and pistons. On the back of the ship is a propeller and a rudder.

I'm not sure how to put this, but even on the page, this black and white two-dimensional drawing of an airship appears to be flying. The text on the patent says that Charles F. Page of Pineville, Louisiana, has "invented certain new and useful improvements to airships." And then proceeds with a long meticulously detailed description of how the airship works. And in the interview, Eva Page says the same thing we heard from Joseph Page,

that Charles Page built a full-sized airship,

which offered at least $100,000 in prices for aviation. So he shipped his airship on a freight train,

and for reasons that were never known, the airship did not make it.

And this is where the mystery occurs, and we have to rely on family stories, the ship never made it there.

“And the only thing I can think is the massive prejudice of the time,”

somebody stole it and destroyed it. And that's what the family says. I see no other reasonable alternative, the train didn't wreck along the way, and I think because of this disaster, the loss of his airplane, he had a major investment in this.

I think he lost hard in it, and he gave up on it. I wanted to know how things might have gone. If Charles Page and his airship had arrived at the Louisiana Purchase Exposition, so I just a research in this thing was a spectacle. So the main airship competition was actually a race.

The favorite to win the race was a fabulously wealthy Brazilian man named Alberto Santos-Dumont, aka the Wizard of the Air. It's unclear to me if that nickname was given to Santos-Dumont, or if he gave it to himself. In any case, Santos-Dumont had already flaunted his airship

at an exhibition in Paris. He arrived in St. Louis to a crush of reporters and fans, clamoring to see the man who had reportedly flown. You're probably picturing a small man in a suit with a mustache, and a bolder hat, and that's exactly right.

That's exactly what he looks like.

“Leaning into his pinched for drama and flair,”

Santos-Dumont told the St. Louis Dispatch, "If the world's fair accomplishes nothing more for science than to stimulate the conquest of air by man, it will have served a noble purpose." Dumont's main competition was a man from California,

also wealthy named Tom Baldwin, who had designed an airship called The Arrow. It's worth mentioning that none of these airships look like Charles Page's airship. They have oblong cigar-shaped balloons

with skimpy metal scaffolding that converge on a tiny seat for the pilot beneath the balloon, and somewhere in there you'll find a propeller and a rudder. It's more of a guideable blimp than an airship. In the competition itself was very eventful.

After testing his airship, Tom Baldwin, the Californian, was attempting to tie down the vessel when the crew lost control of the ropes. The airship took flight without a pilot, and was discovered days later in a field miles away.

But despite this one blunder,

“Baldwin's airship was making very impressive test runs”

around the exposition's grounds. Baldwin appeared to be a real contender. And that's when scandal struck. In the middle of the night, leading up to the much-anticipated airship race,

someone had gone into Alberto Santos Dumont's hangar and slashed his balloons with a knife. At first, the detective assigned to the case suspected it was someone hired by a competitor, but the hangar was heavily guarded.

The detective ultimately deduced that nobody could have slashed the balloons but Santos Dumont himself. But why? Because Santos Dumont feared losing the competition

and couldn't tolerate the embarrassment. Santos Dumont was outraged by the accusation. He left in a half, taking his torn-up balloons back to Paris for repair, vowing to return to St. Louis to prove his aeronautical prowess.

When the airship race finally took place in December of 1904, Santos Dumont had not returned. And of the remaining contestants, nobody was able to complete the course. The $100,000 prize was left on the table. But just take a second to imagine how surprised

these well-heeled swash-buckling pioneers of the sky would have been by the arrival of Charles Frederick Page, a black man with no formal education, very little money, in an airship that, in my personal opinion,

is far more elegant than anything else on display. Would Charles Page of Pineville, Louisiana, have beaten the likes of Captain Thomas Baldwin, or another contestant named Count Henry Delivolks? We'll never know.

Charles Page never made it to St. Louis,

and neither did his airship. However, on April 10, 1906, two years after the winner-less Louisiana purchase exposition, Page's airship patent was formally approved by the United States government.

Now, what's fascinating is the timing. That was the 1904 World's Fair. It took three years for his patent to go through. It also took the right brothers, three years for their patent to go through.

Charles Frederick Page's patent for his airship, his controllable vehicle for the sky, beats the right brothers by one month in being issued. He gets a patent one month before the right brothers. Oh, my God.

Now, these are different devices. One is an airship, and the other is an airplane. One heavier than air, one lighter than air. But still, the fact that Charles Page got his patent for a flying vessel before the vented bright brothers is pretty remarkable.

We'll probably never be able to prove that Charles Page

and we'll probably never find out why it didn't make it to St. Louis.

And maybe most mysterious of all,

“we may never know why Charles Page stopped pursuing his airship.”

Because even if there wasn't a physical ship, people were very interested in his patent. Michael Wynn was able to recover three pieces of original correspondence regarding Charles Page. Less than three weeks after Page's patent was approved,

he received a letter from a businessman in Pennsylvania, named CG Crispin, asking if the patent was for sale. Then, a couple weeks later, CG Crispin wrote another letter. And this time, he had a lot more to say. Crispin writes, quote,

"We have investigated your patent very thoroughly, and our judgment is it ought to sell for $30,000." This airship easily excels anything also in its line that is on the market today. And the third piece of correspondence

was between Page and someone else. All we have for that third person is an envelope with a return address. Arthur's patent exhibition, 209 State Street, Chicago, Illinois.

On the back of the envelope, as a handwritten note that says, "Receive from A Arthur," September 24, 1907.

“We don't know what became of those dealings”

between Charles Page, CG Crispin, and A Arthur. All we have are those three pieces of correspondence. One of them stating that the patent for Page's airship was worth an estimated 30 grand,

about a million dollars in today's money.

I have zero information why never happened.

I believe it was an honest offer, but we have zero information. The story of Charles Page's airship. Certainly has its fair share of unanswered questions. But despite all that,

Michael thought that what was known about Charles Page's achievements was certainly worth sharing. So he started writing articles and appearing on any local news media that would have him. I'm on television a lot here in Radio and everything,

and I was talking about Page, and I get a call from Joe, and he said, "I'm as grandson." I said, "I hope you're happy with everything I'm doing." He says, "I'm a static with everything you're doing."

I've tried to fight this when I was young, trying to get the word out, and people just, it's either one of two things. They don't believe you, or they don't want to believe you.

But there was a historian slash inventor on the East Coast who did believe Joseph and Michael. And furthermore, he believed that if Charles Frederick Page's airship can disappear, then it can reappear.

In 2016, Time Magazine published a special issue

“featuring the 100 most important inventors of all time.”

A man named James Howard was checking out of the grocery store when he noticed the issue on the magazine rack. And on the front cover of this special edition, you saw the likely heroes. You saw the Edison's, right?

You saw the Ford's, you know? You saw the Tesla's and the Alexander Graham Bell's, and you even saw present-day heroes like Steve Jobs. James was not looking through this magazine as a casual reader. For 35 years, he has taught design and design history.

He's an inventor himself, with over 35 patents. To him, the Time Magazine list presented a great opportunity to honor inventors who in the past had not gotten there due because of racial prejudice. Now, Lloyd, I'm okay with not necessarily seeing a black face on the cover.

I opened up this magazine and I see not a single black face.

Finally, James made it to the last page.

And on the last page, there is one tiny thumbnail image of a black inventor who, upon casual observation, could pass his white. And James felt he had two options. He could be angry and hope that the next time around,

lists such as these would include black inventors, or he could take action. He chose the latter and got to work on developing the country's first black inventor's Hall of Fame. He and a team of other experts would make their own list.

In our conversation, James gave me an abridged history of black inventors in America. And it was clear to me that I had not been taught this history before. Time magazine is not the only guilty party in omitting or overlooking black inventors.

Their accomplishments have been overlooked for centuries. Take this example. One of the first major contributions by a black innovator in the United States can be traced back to a man named Onesimus. Onesimus lived in Boston during the 1721 smallpox epidemic,

a disease which killed 30% of its victims. And as the disease decimated Boston, Onesimus recommended a novel procedure. Procedure entailed rubbing pus from a smallpox wound into an open wound on the arm of an uninfected person.

This provided a way to introduce antibodies. And in one key study, the fatality rate dropped from one and seven to one in 40.

from the ravages of smallpox,

“with his introduction of the inoculation procedure”

that would go on to eventually become the world's first

patented that scene, except he did not receive credit for it. In this pattern of developing an innovation and receiving no credit, essentially defines the experience of black inventors in America. By 2023, James was deep into the planning

for the black inventors Hall of Fame, when he received an email from a board member. One of my board members sends me a link on Charles Frederick Page. There has a little video captioning everything.

And that was my first time ever hearing and learning about Charles Frederick Page. And the link that he sent me included, Michael Winne. I was so moved by it,

that I got in touch with Michael Winne as soon as I got back to the office. Michael Winne was thrilled. He shared all of his research with James, who spent weeks absorbing the story.

The man who was born into slavery who became a self-taught engineer

“who invented and reportedly built an airship,”

sending it off to the Great Louisiana Purchase Exposition of 1904, only to have it mysteriously disappear. When we learned that Charles Frederick Page airship had disappeared,

and it never arrived at its destination

within that you have a lot of mystery right as to, "Okay, well, what happened to it? You know, where did it go?" Well, we don't have to be rocket scientists to sort of some lies where it went.

It was purposely sequestered. It was purposely helped back. There was no way that the powers that be, particularly in that particular region of the United States at the time,

was going to take a chance on the acknowledgement of this black man who has the audacity to be building a freaking airship at the same time, all of your right and will be right.

We're building their flying machine. We have the audacity to ship it off. He had hoped to win that prize.

“And you're talking about a dream deferred.”

You can't get any more deferred than that that has become the storyline that sort of encapsulates dozens upon dozens and hundreds upon hundreds of black inventors that came before him

as well as those that have come since. So I want to go back to that time magazine issue. The one that motivated James to help enshrine the accomplishments of black inventors. The editor talks about what makes a great American inventor.

It's "to invent and commercially succeed

in shaping the world's first mass society

as Steve Jobs puts it to put a dent in the universe. To commercially succeed, that phrase brings me back to those letters that Michael Winn recovered. The correspondence between Charles Frederick Page and two men who were interested in shopping is patent.

CG Crispin from Pennsylvania and A Arthur from Chicago. These letters represent Charles Page's attempts to commercially succeed with his ideas. But neither paned out and Charles Page stopped trying. Why?

I did a deep dive on both of these men to see if I could find anything relevant with respect to page or other inventions they might have been selling. Who were these guys? What were they up to? Let's start with the first one. CG Crispin.

Crispin was a very well respected businessman and inventor out of Burwick, Pennsylvania. He was a Cornell graduate, the president of Burwick's First National Bank. He invented a water valve that was used across multiple industries. A very well respected guy.

It's possible that Charles Page granted Crispin permission to exhibit his patent and nobody bought it. Or maybe for some reason page didn't send it in. We don't know. The more mysterious character, though, was A Arthur.

All we have is that envelope with a return address. And on the back of the envelope, there's a handwritten note that reads, "Receives from A Arthur" on September 25, 1907.

It took me a long time to find anything about A Arthur. But after a while, I was able to figure out that this guy's full name was Adam Arthur. Adam Arthur specialized in hosting and promoting patent exhibitions. But in early 1907, the building, housing is exhibition,

burned to the ground. Pushing Arthur to the brink of financial ruin. And that's when I came across an article about Arthur from the Chicago Tribune. The article was dated October 25,

exactly one month after Charles Page's correspondence with him. The headline reads, "Wife, creditors, and federal officials, hunt for Adam Arthur denounced as a swindler." Apparently, Adam Arthur was riding to inventors saying,

"If you send me a deposit, I will exhibit your work.

Except he wasn't sending the money back. He was pocketing everything.

“Including, I believe, Charles Page's deposit.”

I believe Charles Frederick Page was scammed. I think the evidence strongly suggests that he sent in the deposit

expecting to have it returned, but the money never came back.

And as a temperament in Pineville, Louisiana, with a wife and 11 kids, Charles Page decided that dealing with untrustworthy strangers in far-flung cities was not something he could afford to do any longer.

That's why Charles Page couldn't commercially succeed with his intellectual property. He was taken advantage of. As a poor black man in Louisiana, he had no means for recourse.

Perhaps if Charles Page were not born into slavery and thrust into the nightmare of Jim Crow, he would have met the criteria for times 100 most important inventors. Charles Page's whole experience,

the disappearance of his machine, the obstacles to prevent him from profiting from his invention. The lack of recognition for a scientific achievements. It all represented a highly emblematic story for the black inventors Hall of Fame.

“And as a result, James has decided to make”

Charles Frederick Page a centerpiece of the museum. You're going to be able to go in there and you're going to be able to learn of Charles Frederick Page's story that's going to be a little theater in there where you can sit on a bench and see a six to eight minute recapturing of his story

when he first learned that his airship had disappeared.

But as James planned the Charles Page exhibit, he couldn't seem to take his eyes off those original patent designs. The beautifully drawn renderings of this magical flying ship.

Yes, James is a historian. And yes, he is developing a museum. But he is also a working inventor. So he decided to do some experimenting. I took elected patent drawings

and I challenged my model maker and say, "Listen, let's take these and let's extrapolate them into 3D renderings, 3D models." Then I say, "I want to take a one step further. Let's extract these into built information modeling.

I can't do architecture drawings, right? Where you can literally sort of like build

“the building before you physically build it.”

And I saw the credibility of his propulsion system and his guiding system

and then the brilliance of the balloons

and the tethers and the deck and everything. I say to myself, you know what? This has to be built but not a model. I told my board, I say, "Listen, we need to build a full size replica."

It was a bold idea in one which presented an obvious challenge. Who do you hire to build a 120 year old airship? Well, James happened to have a relationship

with a London-based company that helped him with a replica of a P-51 fighter plane for a Tuskegee Airman exhibit. The company has called a spirit in the sky and they specialize in, quote,

aerial filming solutions for feature films, music videos, TV productions and commercials. You've actually probably seen their work in movies like Mission Impossible, Dead Reckoning with the 007 movie, No Time to Die,

or the Apple series, Masters of the Sky. These guys are the real deal. So James showed the page rendering to his point of contact there. I'd like to show you these models

that we built in the computer and can you extrapolate this into an actual full size item? Then I told him that I wanted to have it on display in my museum.

He looked at all the drawings. He called me back and said, "James, this and man, why would you want to put in your museum?" He says, "Why don't you go ahead and let us make this baby fly?" And I said, "What, uh, we can consider that."

And now to actually build the ship, James has partnered with an engineering group in Maine. At the time this episode was released, the ship was still under construction, but what seems clear to both James and all the engineers involved

is that the airship can fly. So I asked James, you know, there's some speculation on whether Charles Frederick Page flew the original airship, whether or not he actually got it off the ground.

Do you have an opinion on that? I do have an opinion. I'll be honest with you. I think that as an inventor, you have to understand,

your invention becomes one with you. You live it, you eat it, you breathe it, right? And I firmly believe. I firmly believe that Charles Frederick Page attempted to lift this airship

above the ground and fly. And then you have to think about this. You go back and read the requirements of the Louisiana's World Fair competition. It's a requirement that whatever it is you present

has to work. Why? Because at the world's fair, it was the intention to showcase these not on the ground, but in here, right? So if you trace it all the way back

to what the moment required, this man felt confident to measure up to that moment.

But about 120 years after it reportedly disappeared

“on its way to the Louisiana purchase exposition,”

Charles Page's airship will reappear. Though he will not be there to enjoy it, Page's work will be on display for the world to see. And if someone really did destroy Page's airship,

that person will have ultimately failed

to suppress this man's undeniable, innovative brilliance. In the beginning of this episode, I mentioned those specialty quarters released by the United States men. The back of the North Carolina Quarter

shows the Wright Brothers. As it should,

“the Wright Brothers have a completely legitimate claim”

as leading pioneers in aviation.

But they weren't the only pioneers in aviation. There were others who had overcome more than just the forces of gravity. Well, on the back of the Louisiana specialty quarter, you will see two things,

a map of the Louisiana purchase, the epic land deal that was commemorated by the exposition of 1904.

And above that, you'll see a bird.

Though it was not intended this way, I hope those two images

“always remind you of a great American inventor,”

named Charles Frederick Page. Thank you for listening to Family Law. [ Music ] If you have stories you'd like to share about your family, please email me at [email protected].

That's [email protected]. FamilyLore is an Odyssey Original Podcast. It is written and narrated by me, Lloyd Lockridge. Our executive producers are Leah Rees Dennis and I. Our lead producer and sound editor is Zach Clark.

Our story editors are Maddie Sprung Kaiser and Katie Mingle. Additional sound editing mixing and mastering by Chris Bezel and production support by Sean Cherry. Special thanks to more occurin, Josephina Francis, Kurt Courtney, Hillary Schuff, and Laura Berman.

Thanks again for listening to FamilyLore. And if you have time, we'd love for you to rate and review the show. [ Music ] For years, Gone South has been a podcast about crime in the American South. But for our new season, we're widening the lens.

Through deeply reported narrative-driven stories, we're digging into the myths, scandals, and power structures that still shape the South in a lot of ways, the country itself. Follow and listen to Gone South Season 5, an Odyssey podcast, available now on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your shows.

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