Stone's Hill in 'Tampa Town', Florida is chosen as the site for the cannon's construction. In the end, nearly five and a half million dollars are raised, which ensures the financial feasibility of the project. donates four million dollars, whilst England, at first, does not give anything. The first obstacle, enough money to construct the giant cannon (and against which Nicholl has bet $1,000), is raised from a number of countries in America and Europe.

After receiving the support of his companions, another meeting is held to decide the place from which the projectile will be fired, the dimensions and materials of both the cannon and the projectile, and which kind of powder they are to use.Īn old enemy of Barbicane, a Captain Nicholl of Philadelphia, designer of plate armor, declares that the entire enterprise is absurd and makes a series of bets with Barbicane, each of them of increasing amount, over the impossibility of such a feat. He's done some calculations, and believes that they could construct a cannon capable of shooting a projectile to the Moon. The Baltimore Gun Club, a society dedicated to the design of weapons of all kinds (especially cannons), comes together when Impey Barbicane, its president, calls them to support his latest idea. The story opens some time after the end of the American Civil War. The character of Michel Ardan, the French member of the party in the novel, was inspired by the real-life photographer Félix Nadar. However, his version of a space gun for a non-rocket spacelaunch turned out to be impractical for safe human space travel since a much longer barrel would have been required to reach escape velocity while limiting acceleration to survivable limits for the passengers. The story is also notable in that Verne attempted to do some rough calculations as to the requirements for the cannon and in that, considering the comparative lack of empirical data on the subject at the time, some of his figures are remarkably accurate.

Five years later, Verne wrote a sequel called Around the Moon. It tells the story of the Baltimore Gun Club, a post- American Civil War society of weapons enthusiasts, and their attempts to build an enormous Columbiad space gun and launch three people-the Gun Club's president, his Philadelphian armor-making rival, and a French poet-in a projectile with the goal of a Moon landing. From the Earth to the Moon: A Direct Route in 97 Hours, 20 Minutes ( French: De la Terre à la Lune, trajet direct en 97 heures 20 minutes) is an 1865 novel by Jules Verne.

Jules verne balloon