How did Verne come to be so closely associated with hot air balloons?

[Ana Klimchynskaya]

Hi all,
With apologies for the perhaps obvious question... I've been thinking
a lot recently about the iconography of Verne in the popular
imagination, and it seems that the hot air balloon is one of the
technologies most closely associated with Verne's works. I've seen it
on candles, book covers, postcards, advertisements...just about
everywhere. I'm curious how this has come to be. Certainly Verne has
some works about hot air balloons (e.g. Five Weeks in a Balloon), but
they are also absent from his most famous works (20,000 Leagues,
Journey to the Center of the Earth, From the Earth to the Moon, Around
the World). More than that, Verne was a proponent of heavier-than-air
flight - the opposite of balloons! Can we chalk it all up to the film
adaptation of Around the World in 80 Days, which shoehorned a balloon
into the narrative? Or are there other explanations?

Anastasia

[volker.dehs]

Hi Anastasia,

your explanation (influence of the Todd adaptation) may be right. Many of the book covers (probably around 30% or even more) of Around the World show a balloon - against all plausibility! The balloon is a nostalgic icon, like the steampunk movement, and constantly related to Jules Verne. Other members of the Forum have eventually another explanation ?...

Best, VD

[Dennis Kytasaari]

Brian Taves often cited the Michael Todd film as the biggest factor in the balloon iconography of Verne.

Dennis

--
Sent from my Android device with K-9 Mail. Please excuse my brevity.

[Tad Davis]

The closest thing I can think of is the early story “A Drama in the Air” (originally “A Voyage in a Balloon,” which is in the Palik volume Worlds Known and Unknown; later version in Doctor Ox and Other Stories). It’s a pretty harrowing story and has a lot of info about balloon flight and technology (and fatal accidents!) up through the time of writing. But I don’t think the story is well known enough to account for how widespread the imagery is.

— 

Tad Davis

tad.dav...@gmail.com

On Mar 14, 2026, at 10:23 PM, 'Dennis Kytasaari' via Jules Verne Forum <jules-ve...@googlegroups.com> wrote:



--
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Jules Verne Forum" group.
To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to jules-verne-fo...@googlegroups.com.
To view this discussion visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/jules-verne-forum/F6A7D066-3B4A-4B70-BF2D-15F7E222B53E%40epguides.com.

[Garmt de Vries-Uiterweerd]

The influence of Mike Todd's film adaptation does seem to be a plausible hypothesis. You could test the hypothesis by comparing candles, book covers, postcards and advertisements from before 1956 to similar items from after 1956.

A balloon also features prominently on various Hetzel covers. This may have had more influence on popular imagination in France than elsewhere, so a way to test this hypothesis could be to compare French candles, book covers, postcards and advertisements to similar items from other countries.

I am not aware of any serious investigation of this kind.

Cheers,

Garmt

--

[Ron Miller]

Verne is only associated with hot air balloons because people think that all balloons are hot air balloons. Hot air balloons were passe by the time Verne was writing. All of the balloons in his books are gas balloons...which were standard at the time. Hot air balloons didn't make a comeback until the middle of the 20th century.

But it is true that Verne is closely associated with balloons in the public mind. They certainly play an important role in several of his books. But I think that the association really stems from the movie, "Around the World in 80 Days". I've attached a sampling of the many editions of "80 Days" currently on the market...and every single one of them features a balloon.

R

On Sat, 14 Mar, 2026 at 9:10 PM, Ana Klimchynskaya <anaklimc...@gmail.com> wrote:

 

To: jules-ve...@googlegroups.com

Hi all,
With apologies for the perhaps obvious question... I've been thinking
a lot recently about the iconography of Verne in the popular
imagination, and it seems that the hot air balloon is one of the
technologies most closely associated with Verne's works. I've seen it
on candles, book covers, postcards, advertisements...just about
everywhere. I'm curious how this has come to be. Certainly Verne has
some works about hot air balloons (e.g. Five Weeks in a Balloon), but
they are also absent from his most famous works (20,000 Leagues,
Journey to the Center of the Earth, From the Earth to the Moon, Around
the World). More than that, Verne was a proponent of heavier-than-air
flight - the opposite of balloons! Can we chalk it all up to the film
adaptation of Around the World in 80 Days, which shoehorned a balloon
into the narrative? Or are there other explanations?

Anastasia

--

You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Jules Verne Forum" group.
To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to jules-verne-fo...@googlegroups.com.

To view this discussion visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/jules-verne-forum/CAHFv7gUYhpUytwZRt0At3jFXAqFCcc%3Dc3FUtqQ%2BhGpBF_%3DDmSg%40mail.gmail.com.
.

[Garmt de Vries-Uiterweerd]

Ouch. I suspect a fair number of these are ripoffs / piracy / AI drab, but still…

To view this discussion visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/jules-verne-forum/3OBWH714RSU4.UE6CFJPEI7XA3%40luweb02oc.

[Jean Demerliac]

Hi all,

In the opening prologue of Todd’s film, 16 celebrity cameos posed at the foot of a DC-7 before being ushered to their seats by Monsieur Gasse (Charles Boyer), who, in the film, runs the Thomas Cook & Son agency in Paris. In my opinion, the presence of the balloon in the film—admittedly a bit “retro” and “iconic" (in the style of Jules Verne)—has a lot to do with the promotion of air travel and mass tourism in the 1950s. The balloon allows for the inclusion of aerial tourist views in the film (including the châteaux of the Loire Valley!). The film’s promotion, the original prologue (later replaced by the Apollo rocket), and its reception all point to the airplane, in a sense, “under” that balloon.

To view this discussion visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/jules-verne-forum/CAFuNt7cG_pTTr1hAuvRtGSEWNEM_gvS21_hRxhwDTQEksk4TSA%40mail.gmail.com.

[Alex Kirstukas]

S. J. Perelman, who did most of the screenplay for Todd's film, wrote about the experience in a New Yorker piece called "Around the Bend in Eighty Days." There's a bit of dialogue in it where Perelman brings up this whole issue:

“Look, Buster,” I said. “Once and for all, let’s get something straight. There’s no mention of a balloon in the book. Todd lifted that from another guzma of Verne’s, Five Weeks in a Balloon.”

“Fancy,” he said. “Now, why did he do that?”

“Because it wasn’t nailed down,” I said.

To view this discussion visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/jules-verne-forum/CANQV44QdMWBkumJb5Asz6EtN0sWUMDDMUwLkBbXcOQYR%3DUhqFw%40mail.gmail.com.

[Don Sample]

Who was it first said “Good writers borrow from other writers. Great writers steal outright?”

I first encountered it in an episode of The West Wing.

On Mar 15, 2026, at 1:15 PM, Alex Kirstukas <alex.ki...@gmail.com> wrote:



To view this discussion visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/jules-verne-forum/CANGnu4eE3N%2BetJtgVovVXtWtnWwNKKZsq-HXOhjvO3te8AUrZA%40mail.gmail.com.

[Ana Klimchynskaya]

So I went digging around, and, while Wikipedia is not always a 100%
reliable source, I was intrigued by this paragraph: \

One of the most famous sequences in the film, the flight by hydrogen
balloon, is not in the original Jules Verne novel. Because the film
was made in Todd-AO, the sequence was expressly created to show off
the locations seen on the flight, as projected on the giant curved
screen used for the process. A similar balloon flight can be found in
an earlier Jules Verne novel, Five Weeks in a Balloon, in which the
protagonists explore Africa from a hydrogen balloon.

It does seem like the film has had a significant influence. And yes, a
hot air balloon features on various Hetzel covers, but so do other
scenes from the novels, so it's interesting that that's the one that
got latched on to. I do think there is also a difference between the
anglophone and francophone world: in France, anything Verne-themed
(carousels, plays, etc) tends to only incorporate hot air balloons as
they appeared in Verne's novels, alongside other book-accurate scenes
from his novels. Which would lend credence to the hypothesis that the
movie was quite influential in the Francophone world...

I have lots of photographs of Verniana from my travels to France over
the past two years...perhaps I will make a blog post to share them
all.

Anastasia

On Sun, Mar 15, 2026 at 1:34 PM 'Don Sample' via Jules Verne Forum

> To view this discussion visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/jules-verne-forum/27D6E24F-88CE-4455-BC45-0A0E74E84B0C%40mac.com.

[William Butcher]

The sampling omits the OUP edition and translation of Around the World, which has never featured a balloon on the cover.

---

From: 'Ron Miller' via Jules Verne Forum <jules-ve...@googlegroups.com>
Sent: Sunday, March 15, 2026 8:09 PM
To: jules-ve...@googlegroups.com <jules-ve...@googlegroups.com>
Subject: Re: [JVF] How did Verne come to be so closely associated with hot air balloons?

 

To view this discussion visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/jules-verne-forum/3OBWH714RSU4.UE6CFJPEI7XA3%40luweb02oc.

[quentin skrabec]

be very careful with Wikipedia - mistakes are wide spread - most professional with not allow its use -- unless you go to the original paper
Quentt

[Ana Klimchynskaya]

Indeed, I am aware that Wikipedia is not always a reliable source, as I noted in my original email. They teach that as part of getting a PhD :) However, I have often found it a useful place to start, especially when I have a mailing list of Verne aficionados whose insights I can ask about the veracity of the quoted passage. 

To view this discussion visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/jules-verne-forum/041d206f-84f1-43ac-95c5-49a9cb3b7b6en%40googlegroups.com.

[Ron Miller]

This probably sounds petty and pedantic but I do wish that people would stop calling any balloon a "hot air balloon." 

Hot air balloons pretty much became passe after the flight of the first hydrogen balloon in 1783. The hot air balloon didn't regain popularity until the advent of the sport in the 1950s and 1960s. Hot air balloons were not featured on the covers of the Hetzel editions.

R

To view this discussion visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/jules-verne-forum/CAHFv7gWWCgEV2nUnuV7Tn%3Dij7f1QwxTeA-WVjoLvL-88oGV9cw%40mail.gmail.com.

[quentin skrabec]

I think we agree but I won't use Wickpeda to start - unless you are very sure of your grounding. Best to use a journal review article to start- then check wickapedia 

---

From: 'Ron Miller' via Jules Verne Forum <jules-ve...@googlegroups.com>
Sent: Tuesday, March 17, 2026 8:29 AM

To: jules-ve...@googlegroups.com <jules-ve...@googlegroups.com>
Subject: Re: [JVF] How did Verne come to be so closely associated with hot air balloons?

 

This probably sounds petty and pedantic but I do wish that people would stop calling any balloon a "hot air balloon." 

You received this message because you are subscribed to a topic in the Google Groups "Jules Verne Forum" group.
To unsubscribe from this topic, visit https://groups.google.com/d/topic/jules-verne-forum/5PzNuUZx6js/unsubscribe.
To unsubscribe from this group and all its topics, send an email to jules-verne-fo...@googlegroups.com.
To view this discussion visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/jules-verne-forum/CTDRUK8QRSU4.I2JCHSI17NVY1%40luweb03oc.

[Tad Davis]

My own experience with Wikipedia (and with AI tools like Claude and Gemini) has been more positive. They are not authoritative sources, but when you’re coming into a knowledge area that’s completely new and have no idea where to begin, they can sometimes point you in the right direction and cut down on churning. 

Case in point was a project involving Michel and Jules Verne’s story “In the 29th Century.” I had the first English version and the third French version and could see the number of differences. But I also knew there was an intermediate French version. At what point did the changes appear, and who originated them—father or son?

AI pointed to Piero Gondola della Riva as the scholar who had the goods. Great, I said, but in the meantime, while I’m searching for that, is there a summary of his research in English?

The answer was an article by Arthur Evans in Verniana. The query got the issue wrong and the title wrong: the article it pointed me to didn’t exist. (The usual confabulation.) But it had the right author and right journal and approximate date, and with that information I was able to track down the right article, which not only discussed the research but presented English translations of the full text of both the first and second versions of the story: in other words, for my purposes, paydirt. 

The point of all this is that I never would have uncovered this on my own, or if I did it would have taken me additional weeks of looking. The AI query, and by analogy Wikipedia queries, which have served the same purpose for me on many occasions, gave me an important clue as a starting point. 

The problem people run into with this (lawyers especially, to read some of the tech news sites) is repeating the citation without checking it. That’s why I keep saying that, used properly, these are useful tools. 

Tad Davis

— 

Tad Davis

tad.dav...@gmail.com

On Mar 17, 2026, at 12:24 PM, quentin skrabec <qrsk...@gmail.com> wrote:


To view this discussion visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/jules-verne-forum/DM6PR02MB5642E8D5FDBF864C829C7CCCFF41A%40DM6PR02MB5642.namprd02.prod.outlook.com.

[quentin skrabec]

Tad

I agree but only caution with both AI and Wikipedia. My personal approach to starting a research paper is old school literature review to ground myself- if you are well grounded Wikipedia can be a great resource.  then I go to Wikipedia to look for new items. Any new points or things I feel are different or unusual — I do what a call a rathole search. And like you sometimes I find some gold nuggets! One of the forum members sent me a point from French Wikipedia that turned out to be a real jewel. I have found with all its faults Wikipedia is better by far then an AI — although I expect AI will continue to improve. AI references seem more accurate, but I have found the summaries to be problematic. I discussed AI in the forum before with the algorithm can be incorrectly weighed, and databases vary. To that degree Wikipedia has human review . All said Wikipedia can offer some interesting rathole research that turns up much although it can cause hours of fun diversion. 

Quent  

---

From: jules-ve...@googlegroups.com <jules-ve...@googlegroups.com> on behalf of Tad Davis <tad.dav...@gmail.com>
Sent: Tuesday, March 17, 2026 1:34 PM

To view this discussion visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/jules-verne-forum/CCB67D96-F2C5-41DD-873E-CD62739C8CCA%40gmail.com.

[Christian Sánchez]

I have compared the versions of 2890 some time ago: https://www.ara.org.ar/chs/verne/comparafbis.html

To view this discussion visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/jules-verne-forum/CCB67D96-F2C5-41DD-873E-CD62739C8CCA%40gmail.com.

[Tad Davis]

Thank you—this will be very helpful. 

— 

Tad Davis

tad.dav...@gmail.com

On Mar 17, 2026, at 5:29 PM, Christian Sánchez <chvsa...@gmail.com> wrote:



To view this discussion visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/jules-verne-forum/CANyD%3DefkL_H7f%2B3uA_fvctnNivFP9O0%3DhaRk7efQwFJqsM3LQw%40mail.gmail.com.

[James D. Keeline]

The main flaw with Wikipedia is its rules and the humans who interpret them.

For example, they like to cite published sources.  That is good.  But they don't apply critical thinking to evaluate the quality of sources.  Some are good, standard sources.  But for other entries they cite fourth or fifth-level sources.

In the Edward Stratemeyer entry they not only had some direct falsehoods, they also cited some self-published books for the home education market that were about as far removed from primary sources as possible.

They lean towards sources that can be found online.  The error that remained for more than a decade (but was gone on my last visit) stated that Stratemeyer was hired by Gilbert Patten at Street & Smith.  This is exactly opposite of the truth.  Patten was hired by Stratemeyer at the publisher.  Patten's own memoir includes this but that book is not readily available online except in Google Books snippet view.  The erroneous information comes from Dinan.  It is one of many errors in that source.  The Dinan was published by McFarland and they offer generous previews on Google Books so it is easier for the Wikipedia editors to find it.  Thus they get the newer flawed reference and not the older authoritative one.

Wikipedia rules ban edits by Subject Matter Experts (SMEs).  They don't want Wikipedia to include "original research," only citations of material published somewhere, no matter how flawed.

Even if the SME factor was not in play, they won't accept any comments or edits from me because my email is Ja...@Keeline.com and the ".com" says I am trying to sell something.  This really is their tortured logic.  So, since I do use my name "Keeline" as a handle on Wikipedia, they won't accept it.  If I picked something like blueturtledetritus, they would be fine with that.

_____

In an academic forum like this one, it is simply not sufficient to say "AI said" because AI systems are so variable in quality and resources they use.  ChatGPT is generally terrible.  Gemini is decent.  Claude is good for many things.  I haven't tried a lot of the others like Grok, Pilot, etc.  Plus, the output depends on the input.  If you don't show your work with the prompt and the response, anything shared is equivalent to hearsay.  

Woodworking tools can be used to make artistic craftsman pieces and piles of wood shavings and chunks that are little more than kindling for the fire.  It depends on the mind and hand that guides them.  AI tools are in the same category.  Certainly one should not run to copy-paste and share the first response from an AI.  It needs to be evaluated and verified where possible.  The black box approach can sometimes make good or bad results.  Often it provides what it believes you want to read.  Flattery keeps people using AI systems thanks to dopamine with each reinforcing statement.

I use a couple AI systems so I see their value but I also know they can be abused and misinterpreted.

Likewise Wikipedia has a place in the world for a first glance at a topic that might lead to other sources.

James D. Keeline

To view this discussion visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/jules-verne-forum/DM6PR02MB5642AEEB82A2F25E078355D2FF41A%40DM6PR02MB5642.namprd02.prod.outlook.com.

[Tad Davis]

As an occasional contributor and article-fixer at Wikipedia myself, I would like to point out that Wikipedia isn’t a “they” or “them.” I don’t mean that in a personal sense. My contributions have been paltry and mostly focused on audio productions of Shakespeare. I simply mean that it is, by design, a crowd-sourced collection of information, and if anyone finds a mistake in an article, there is nothing stopping said finder from editing the article and correcting it. 

It can be a treasure trove of reliable information, in many cases dealing with obscure topics in more useful  detail than traditional encyclopedias like Britannica. And it is an encyclopedia, like Britannica, which I would think is also not something you would want to cite as a source in an academic publication. It’s a starting point and is only as good as the willingness of people who possess the knowledge to share it. 

The best analogy I can think of is the Junior Woodchuck’s Guidebook. And if you haven’t heard of that, a good “starting point” would be to compare the wealth of information you can find about the comic artist Carl Barks in Wikipedia with the less-than-a-paragraph he rates in Britannica. Find errors in an article about something you have some expertise in? You can fix it, should you be so inclined, for the benefit of the next person. 

Tad

— 

Tad Davis

tad.dav...@gmail.com

On Mar 17, 2026, at 7:41 PM, James D. Keeline <ja...@keeline.com> wrote:



To view this discussion visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/jules-verne-forum/CAGvpz08JN67JZA17aU%2BMCbmuPRK1mDYmd55Ys6JBW6YF14aH7g%40mail.gmail.com.

[Ana Klimchynskaya]

Y'all, 

We have been on this merry-go-round of discussing the merits of AI and Wikipedia many, many times before, and seem to have reached a general consensus that it can occasionally be useful as a tool, but must be carefully checked and verified. I don't think we need to hash this debate out again. In fact, it seems we've thoroughly strayed off topic. 

To view this discussion visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/jules-verne-forum/F32B8A94-A7F0-4385-A70E-D46B025B59AC%40gmail.com.

[Michele Baiano]

 I believe the cause lies in Michael Anderson's 1956 film. The scene of Phileas Fogg in the hot air balloon became so iconic that it ended up on almost all the original posters, turning into the visual symbol of Victorian travel and adventure.

By the way, let me introduce myself: I am Michele Baiano, an Italian Jules Verne enthusiast. I don't chime in very often, but I have been following this excellent mailing list for many years

To view this discussion visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/jules-verne-forum/CAHFv7gUj_SOMOPwtfbvZLJ%3D345%2BJkcOUnxW4GP5-3ytbQGmf9w%40mail.gmail.com.

[quentin skrabec]

Know doubt in my mind it was the movie 

Quent

---

From: 'Michele Baiano' via Jules Verne Forum <jules-ve...@googlegroups.com>
Sent: Thursday, March 19, 2026 12:29 PM

To view this discussion visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/jules-verne-forum/CA%2BB5G-UMn6RnuyHOBPOwtLXggY_mULBTZFaAR6xMSSAP-%3DtY-Q%40mail.gmail.com.

[William Butcher]

Welcome to the Forum! Do you know Irene Zanot, who has written intelligently on Verne? You will be acquainted, I'm sure, with Piero Gondolo della Riva, who has been publishing on Verne since the 1960s.

Bill

---

From: 'Michele Baiano' via Jules Verne Forum <jules-ve...@googlegroups.com>
Sent: Friday, March 20, 2026 12:29 AM

To view this discussion visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/jules-verne-forum/CA%2BB5G-UMn6RnuyHOBPOwtLXggY_mULBTZFaAR6xMSSAP-%3DtY-Q%40mail.gmail.com.