Overview

Charles A. A. Dellschau was born on June 4, 1830, in Brandenburg, Prussia, and immigrated to the United States in 1853, first settling in Texas. The historical record falls silent until 1860, when he is again shown living in Texas, where he marries Antonia Hilt the following year. The so-called ""lost years"" of the secretive Dellschau's life became a matter of controversy when his voluminous, illustrated notebooks surfaced nearly a half-century after his death in 1923 at age 93. Dellschau literally spent the last 20 years of his life closeted away in an attic apartment, creating a fantastical body of art that continues to fascinate. Indeed, today Dellschau is recognized as one of America's leading visionary artists, ranked alongside such world luminaries as Henry Darger and Adolf Woli--Ci. A single page of one of his notebooks now fetches thousands of dollars - and there are thousands of such pages, frenetic productivity being a hallmark of visionary artists. But Dellschau's work - consisting of ink and watercolor illustrations of fanciful flying machines to which he frequently pasted newspaper clippings, or ""press blooms"" as he called them - appears to tell a coherent story of the Sonora (California) Aero Club. Using an anti-gravity gas purportedly invented by one of its members, The Club allegedly turned out a series of experimental aircraft some 50 years before the Wright Brothers first took wing. A mere flight of artistic fancy? Or did Dellschau actually spend his lost years documenting wildly improbable inventions? Were the Aero Club's airships also responsible for many UFO sightings in America? ""The Secrets of Dellschau: The Sonora Aero Club & The Airships of The 1800s, a True Story"" is the first book-length account of Dellschau's life and work.

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9781933665351

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Reviews

...a book packed with interest, coming at a junction of several fascinating areas: outsider art, early flight, coded texts, alternative technologies and even a touch of trippy steampunk. It includes a brief resume of early flight in America and elsewhere (mostly balloon-based), [and] the UFO-like 'Great Airship Mystery' of 1896-7...interesting and puzzling tale of America's early flyboys. - Phil Barker, Fortean Times When he died at the great age of 92 in 1923, Texas butcher Charles A. Dellschau left behind a secret and a mystery. These were a series of notebooks, filled with paintings of fantastic flying machines, which only came to light when his descendants had a clearout. By a process of serendipity, they came to the attention of graphic designer and ufologist Peter Navarro. By decoding and translating writings in and around the pictures, Narvarro pieced together a tale of Dellschau's involvement in a secret society of inventors living in gold-rush California. He created a vivid cast of over 60 characters, and a range of Heath Robinsonish flying machines, the Aeros...They were the work of this secret group, The Sonora Aero Club, and its even more shadowy backer the NYMZA...Whether the audience is ufologist or art appreciator, this broken old man is leading us back into the realms of pure childhood imagination. - Peter Rogerson, Magonia Crenshaw's book on Dellschau is an authoritative source...a fascinating voyage of exploration that opened intriguing doors of possibility. - James Heflin, Valley Advocate We love this book because it tells an utterly unique story which may well be related to the UFO mystery. Or, it may not... This is a wonderfully thought-provoking book... - Jim Mosely, Saucer Smear

Author Information

DENNIS CRENSHAW, recently retired, uses his newfound time to edit a series of continuing research reports, ""Unraveling the Secrets,"" which can be accessed online at thehollowearthinsider.com. He lives in Jacksonville, Florida. PETE NAVARRO was a graphic artist who was instrumental in saving much of Dellschau's work from obscurity.

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