Word: ballooned
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Dates: during 1940-1949
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When Congress chopped the frayed mooring cable of OPA a year ago, there was a good deal of screeching around the big balloon of the U.S. economy. Harry Truman had already tossed out the ballast of wage controls. The cable was about to part anyhow. The first flight without controls soon made even 1940 prices look like something out of great-grandmother's album of souvenirs...
Nevertheless, there was general optimism then. The basis for it was the belief that the balloon would soon level off and that it would finally land, on higher ground than it had rested on before the war, but in a stable position nevertheless. But last week, despite all sorts of order-shouting and lever-jerking, prices were still going up like the balloon that carried Aeronaut Ira Thurston out over Lake Erie...
Small window decorations in New London proper and a bumper crop of balloon venders added something of the spectacular to the occasion but an all day drizzle today considerably dampened the spirits of the revelers...
When the first balloon was ready, lean Jean Boesmans, the Dutch entry, and his wife stepped into the basket. As 40 gallant soldiers of the Republic clung fast to its ropes, Boesmans launched into a flowery speech in praise of French sportsmanship. Just then the band struck up the Dutch National Anthem. "Tell the music to shut up," shouted Boesmans. "Lâchez tout!" (let it go) roared the crowd. Promptly the soldiers dropped the ropes and Boesmans soared aloft, while the crowd shouted: "Vive la Hollande...
Second Thoughts. The Swiss balloon was next on the line. But at the last minute doughty Tilgenkamp had decided that the French postwar gas was too anemic to trust. Without Tilgenkamp, the Swiss balloon, manned by two assistants, struggled to a height of twelve feet and began to settle earthward. The crowd gasped. Like lightning the Swiss aeronauts jerked the strings on their sandbags. Amid a shower of sand the big orange ball went bounding over the treetops, to land 50 kilometers away. "Vive la Suisse!" cried the crowd. Then France's first entry, ample, blonde Mlle. Paulette Weber...