John Leonard Riddell - First New Orleanian to the Moon

[infrogmation]

My rabbit-hole subject of the day is John Leonard Riddell, mid-19th century chair of the chemistry department at New Orleans University (ancestral to Tulane University). Also esteemed botanist, inventor of the binocular microscope, advocate of the germ theory of disease when most medial profession still believed in miasma, geologist, general polymath who also found time to improve the coinage system at the New Orleans Mint and be postmaster...and science fiction writer.

The more I found out about him, the more I wondered why he wasn't better known. Then I read...
"Succession is worse than a crime, it is a blunder!" - John Leonard Riddell.

Ah, a Unionist in the Deep South - not uncommon in New Orleans of the time, but a position likely to get one marginalized or ignored in the next generation dominated by "Lost Causers".

The text of Riddell's 1847 science fiction story "Orrin Lindsey’s Plan of Aerial Navigation" is online. It seems to me that H. G. Wells 1901 "Cavorite" sphere spaceship in "First Men in the Moon" owes more than a little to Riddell's craft! Interesting how Riddell calculates atmospheric pressure and methods needed to provide oxygen for the space trip - is this one of the very first examples of "hard science fiction"?

* Wikipedia article https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Leonard_Riddell

* Orrin Lindsey’s Plan of Aerial Navigation https://louisiana-anthology.org/303_download/texts/riddell--orrin_lindsay_flight/riddell-orrin_lindsays_aerial_navigation..html

* 2012 NecessaryFacts blogspot post: From Texas to the Moon with John Leonard Riddell https://necessaryfacts.blogspot.com/2012/12/from-texas-to-moon-with-john-leonard.html