In 1783 a ballooning craze swept over France. The Montgolfier brothers Joseph and Jacques discovered that by capturing a special gas they thought came from burning fire, they could launch a small balloon into the air. Their experiments proved them correct, and they scaled up with balloons big enough to hold humans, making a public demonstration with a tethered one holding farm animals in front of the royal court. Suddenly every aristocrat wanted to try their hand at flying, and maybe setting a record.

On this day, November 21 in 1783, Pilâtre de Rozier, who made the first human ascent in a tethered balloon, climbed into a balloon basket with Francois Laurent, the marquis d’Arlandes, to complete the first free flight by humans, by an unattached hot air balloon.

The two aeronauts remained in the air for 25 minutes, floating for 5.5 miles before landing in the suburbs of Paris. The Montgolfiers soon one-upped them by launching a massive balloon with seven passengers. They also attempted to lay over the special gas that they discovered, which was really nothing more than heated, buoyant air, discovered first by the ancient philosopher Archimedes circa second century B.C.