AP News, May 30th, 2007
Paul "Ed" Yost, considered the father of modern hot-air ballooning for a successful three-mile trip on a propane-powered balloon, has died. He was 87.
Yost died Sunday at his home in New Mexico, according to a statement from his son.
According to the National Balloon Museum in Indianola, Iowa, Yost piloted the first flight of a balloon using the envelope-and-propane burner system he developed. The 25-minute, three-mile flight departed from Bruning, Neb., in October 1960.
Though the world's first balloon flight is believed to have taken place in France in 1783, Yost is credited for advances in modern ballooning because his propane-burner system made longer flights possible. Before that, fire and helium were used to send balloons aloft.
Born in Bristow, Iowa, in 1919, Yost joined the High Altitude Research Division of General Mills in Minneapolis in 1949 and worked on many balloon projects.
He and three others from General Mills founded Raven Industries in 1956. The modern hot air balloon evolved from a contract Raven received from the Office of Naval Research to create a reusable craft that could carry one man and a load to 10,000 feet and have enough fuel to stay aloft for three hours, the Indianola museum said.
Yost helped found the Balloon Federation of America and helped organize the first U.S. National Ballooning Championship at Indianola. He was inducted into the U.S. Ballooning Hall of Fame in 2004 and was awarded the Lipton Trophy by the British Balloon and Airship Club in 2006.
Yost also is known for other balloon trips. In April 1963, he and Don Piccard made the first hot air balloon flight across the English channel, flying from Rye in England to Gravelines Nord, France in three hours, 17 minutes.
