THE CORVALLIS DAILY GAZETTE — MAY 14, 1909
Professor David Todd Will Use a Balloon ♢ TO TRY TO RECEIVE MESSAGES ♢ Amherst Man Will Ascend Higher Than Ever Before When Planet Is Nearest to the Earth—How Professor Doolittle Would Signal Mars.
Professor David Todd of Amherst College does not believe it absurd to plan for communication with other worlds and in an attempt to get signals from Mars will ascend in a balloon to a height greater than usually reached, says a Boston dispatch. He will be accompanied by Leo Stevens, he aeronaut. This plan to surmount natural difficulties will be tried not later than September, when the planet Mars is nearest the earth.
Professor Todd, speaking of the novel test he has planned, said in part:
“If life really exists on Mars they have been trying for years to get into conversation with us and perhaps wonder what manner of stupid things we are not to respond. Following this assumption, I have thought that we might feel their presence if we could get high enough up. away from the noises and the ether waves that surround us, up in the rarefied regions of our atmosphere with nothing to disturb the communication.
“In mounting high up in the balloon to attempt to intercept any ether waves that may be radiating from the planets I shall be shut into a metal box made of aluminium for lightness and fitted with apparatus to drive out the carbonic acid gas and supply oxygen and with air pressure to prevent sickness. In that way I can ascend much higher
