History
Geery’s adventures with airships began in 1995, after reading The Deltoid Pumpkin Seed, by John McPhee. This book covers the exploits of The Aereon Corporation, founded in the late 1960’s, by the late visionary, Monroe Drew. McPhee explains how the idea for Monroe Drew’s company came from an inventor who lived in the 1800s, and though unsung and forgotten, was flying a steerable dirigible in the 1860s, long before the Wright Brothers took to the air!
Remarkable as that seems, it was Dr. Solomon Andrews, living in Perth Amboy, New Jersey, in the 1860s, who developed an 80 foot long, 39 foot wide, 13 foot high airship, that could glide up and down, turn left and right, and carry him over the streets of New York City, and around part of Long Island (including Oyster Bay, where Geery attended high school. Though it’s not well known, Andrews invented and patented several dozen other items as well, such as the combination lock, the cigarette filter, and fumigators.
Given new materials and power sources, along with engineering considerations, Geery shifted from gliding airships to the hyperblimp design, and the reality of using solar-power, lithium batteries, and fuel cells, as it became apparent that the dream of low cost, clean, renewable air travel is doable with off-the-shelf materials.
Off-shoots of Geery’s work with upward gliding airships include the patented designs shown here:
