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HUDC Handbook: Difference between revisions
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The family appear to have lived at Stanney thereafter.
[[File:BaldwinInTheAir.jpg|450px|thumb|right|Thomas Baldwin's aerial view of Chester which can be seen, together with the River Dee in the corner of this engraving based on his sketch. This is believed to be the first ever actual view of the earth from above.]]
The present Hoole Hall was built c.1760 for Rev John Baldwin with extension and some alterations for the Hamilton family. He had purchased the estate in 1757 from the Bunbury family. His son Thomas Baldwin (1742-1804, or "Baldwyn"), a clergyman, tried, in 1783 after resigning from his position as a Huntingdon curate, to fund the construction of a balloon by subscription, but was unable to raise enough money. A display of Thomas' exploits, which included his design for a "grand naval air balloon" from 1784, was until recently still found at Hoole Hall.
Baldwin's luck was to change when Vincenzo Lunardi, the "dare-devil Italian balloonist", visited Chester in 1785. On Friday, 2nd September the Chester Chronicle reported:
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