CELEBRITY OF THE BOULEVARD.

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXXII, Issue 10042, 12 May 1910, Page 4

CELEBRITY OF THE BOULEVARD.

One of the most interesting personalities of old Paris that is fast disappearing went the way of all flesh recently. It was M. Felix Tournachon, better known as Nadar. In his time he has been medical student, journalist, artist, politician, engineer, photographer and aeronaut. Nadar, who had reached the age of ninety, belonged to that almost ex- ' tinct type of true Bohemian which in tbe last century flourished on the congenial soil of France, and no man in his time played more parts. As long qgo as the early sixties he outlined the heavier-than-air principle ot the modern aeroplane, and al- ! though his ideas became the butt of the cafe-concert and the comic press of the gay Paris of the Second Empire, he lived to say, when he heard of M. Bleriot's flight across the Channel, "Now I can die happy!" With his shock of flaming red hair, Nadar was a typical bculevard celebrity. He was in turn journalist, pamphleteer, caricaturist, revolutionary, aeronaut and photographer, and in each capacity he achieved fame. He was an intimate of Baudelaire* Alphonse, Daudet, Theophile Gautier, Victor Hugo and Offenbach. His goodness of heart was unbounded. He delighted to do good by stealth. He risked his life by concealing a refugee communard from Governmental reprisals in 1871. It was he who hid the famous General Bergeret in his house, and who boldly went to Thiers and asked for a passport for his friend. "Hullo," said Thiers, when he saw him, "haven't you been shot yet?" "No, general," was the reply, " that depends on you." This extraordinary man also became one of the prefcucsora„ .«£,-colour photo? graphy. In 1862 he took up ballooning, and constructed the biggest balloon on record, Le Geant, which carried 14 people and contained 215,363 cubic feet of gas. His first ascent with 14 persons in 1863 was successful, and created an enormous sensation, but the Geant came to grief on its next trip. After a terrible ex perience the monster fell to earth near Hanover. None of the occupants were hurt, but Mme. Nadar, who accompanied her husband, -found that her hair had turned white during the trip.