Have You Heard Stories of a Monkey Parachuting out of a Balloon in Houston? Around 1900.

[PRONG HORN 3146]

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Heights used to the City of Heights, MKT railway (Missouri Kentucky Kansas Tennessee Texas railway) had a rail line where the current MKT bike path is and Heights was one of the first areas to have electricity outside of Galveston & Houston. There used to be an electric trolly that would go from Houston to Heights and that was why Heights had electricity.

Apparently on 19th street near the Water works place, there was a few bars and every Sunday there was a hot air balloon that a bar would send up a monkey with a parachute and the monkey would jump down. It must have been quite a show.

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Supposedly the monkey was trained to jump on its own volition after hearing a gunshot from the ground. It was part of a carnival set up by the Streetcar Company to get people from Houston to pay for the train ride to watch the monkey jump. I would guess they spent a couple of weeks at most in Houston. By 1903, the jumping monkey was mentioned in Billboard magazine, and would have imitators begin to pop-up around the same time.

 

Any Grandparents ever say anything about this?  From a discussion on Reddit ..

The 1915 USGS topo map for the Bellaire Quadrangle of Harris County indicates a “Poor Farm” north of Bissonnet and just West of Edloe St.

[WhatTheBuck 28788]

As God is my witness, I thought monkeys could fly. 

[atomheartbevo 89729]

This is a good thread title to start off the year for Surly, even if it's aimed at getting armybrat to talk about his youth.

[Wally Fairway 5559]

9 minutes ago, WhatTheBuck said:

As God is my witness, I thought monkeys could fly. 

I've seen a horse fly, and a dragon fly, I've even seen a house fly but I've never seen a monkey fly

[UTGrad98 2280]

If these recent new threads are any indication how 2023 will go here at surly, we're fucked.

[Longhornstampede 3184]

But did that monkey ever bite anyone?

[PRONG HORN 3146]

4 minutes ago, Longhornstampede said:

But did that monkey ever bite anyone?

 

 

No, but it tore up a lady's bonnet in France.  

MONKEY

 

 

[Pato del Muerto 52524]

Sha, and monkeys might fly out of my butt!

-state of Texas 

[HornOnTheBayou 8931]

43 minutes ago, atomheartbevo said:

This is a good thread title to start off the year for Surly, even if it's aimed at getting armybrat to talk about his youth.

"So I tied an onion to my belt, which was the style at the time. Now, to take the ferry cost a nickel, and in those days, nickels had pictures of bumblebees on 'em. "Gimme five bees for a quarter," you'd say."

[Baboontyme 2813]

I'll ask around

[ScottS 1065]

Who is the Surly poster who own Great Heights Brewing?  This monkey parachuting from a hot air balloon thing sounds like something he needs to do.

[RDCanecutter 26452]

I was one of several small boys who got in a spitting contest with a chimp. That chimp was picking us off like the Bible-verse-quoting sniper from Saving Private Ryan.

[Gatorubet 30246]

I’m still confused. I mean, at some point someone made a conscious choice how to spend their time - either teaching the monkey to rip off your testicles or to jump out of a basket with a parachute.

Who knows.  Maybe they let the monkey choose. 

[YGIFS 19452]

I'd like to think the monkey was already trained, ripped the Captain's balls off at altitude, ate them, shut off the helium feed, yelled to the rest of the passengers "See you fuckers in hell", jumped off with this chute yelling "Currahee!"  

Maybe he signs his lines, I dunno.  All I know is you can teach him some basic vocab if you can train him to be a ball-ripping paratrooper.  

Edited January 4, 2023 by YGIFS

[Js1 85412]

On 1/1/2023 at 8:06 PM, atomheartbevo said:

This is a good thread title to start off the year for Surly, even if it's aimed at getting armybrat to talk about his youth.

[GreenspointTexas 9649]

On 1/1/2023 at 10:04 PM, ScottS said:

Who is the Surly poster who own Great Heights Brewing?  This monkey parachuting from a hot air balloon thing sounds like something he needs to do.

@patrickdrinksbeer

 

 

make it happen