This subsubseries includes prints (both original and reproduction), handbills, and plates from publications, and is arranged chronologically by the date of the event or (in the case of portraits) of publication.

Eighteenth-century events represented include the first hydrogen balloon ascent, Champ de Mars, Paris, August 27, 1783; the first three human balloon ascents (by François Pilatre de Rosier and François Laurent, Marquis d'Arlandes, from la Muette, November 21, 1783; by Jacques Charles and Noel Robert, from the garden of the Tuilleries, December 1, 1783; and of "Le Flesselle", at Lyon, January 19, 1784); and Jean-Pierre Blanchard and Dr. John Jeffries making the first Channel crossing, January 7, 1785. The materials include portraits of Etienne and Joseph Montgolfier, 1783; and of James Sadler, the first English balloonist, 1785. The materials also include several prints relating to Vincent Lunardi, including an engraving of his "Grand Air Balloon", 1785, a print of Lunardi, Mrs. Sage, and George Biggin ascending in Lunardi's balloon, 1785, and two caricatures, "The English Balloon, 1784" of Lunardi's 1784 balloon, and "Aerostation out at Elbows or the itinerant Aeronaut" (1785)--attributed to Thomas Rowlandson--of Lunardi himself. Several prints depict various proposed methods of steering balloons, in particular the use of eagles. "Inventé pour le bien present et celui de la posterité", a satirical representation of a fantastic airship, is derived from the engraving "Pro bono publico", first printed by Willir in 1784. Francesco Guardi's drawing of the ascent by Count Francesco Zambeccari over the Giudecca Canal, Venice, 1784, may possibly be a forgery, as it appears to be a line-for-line copy of the drawing illustrated in James Byam Shaw, The Drawings of Francesco Guardi (London: Faber and Faber, [1949]), plate 46. (A reproduction of Guardi's painting based on this drawing is in subseries 1.4, box 5, item 18.)

Ballooning materials from the 19th century include prints and handbills relating to ascents by James Sadler (1810, 1812, 1813), John Hampton (1839), and Charles Green (1845, 1851), as well as to a parachute descent by A. J. Garnerin in England, 1802, and to other parachute descents at Philadelphia and Easton, 1850. Well known balloons depicted include Count Lennox's "Eagle", 1835; the "Vauxhall Royal Balloon" (later "Great Nassau Balloon"), 1836; Professor Lowe's "Mammoth Balloon", 1859; and the French balloon "L'Esperance", 1865. The "Great Steam Duck" of Louisville, 1841, represents the 19th-century American public's fascination with fantastic flying machines. Prints of the ceremonial use of balloons include the coronation of Napoleon and Josephine, 1804; the festivities of the Grand Jubilee, Green Park, London, 1814; and Carlos E. Pellegrini, "Fiestas Mayas en Buenos Aires" (1841). Prints of the military use of balloons include the battle of Fleurus, 1794; the battle of Fair Oaks, Virginia, 1862; a reproduction of a photograph by Matthew Brady of soldiers inflating professor Lowe's balloon, circa 1861-1864; Eugène Godard building balloons in the gare d'Orléans, Paris, during the Franco-Prussian War, 1871; and the trials of the dirigible "la France", 1884. Balloons are also represented in several satirical prints, including James Gillray's 1810 caricature of the installation of Lord Grenville as Chancellor of Oxford University; "Ascending and Descending, or Balloon and Dragoon, A scene at Portobello Baracks, June 27th, 1822"; and Every Body's Album, & Caricature Magazine, 1834. The Gillray caricature differs in details from the print usually described (cf. Draper Hill, ed., Fashionable Contrasts: Caricatures by James Gillray [London: Phaidon Press, 1966], plate 49) and may represent an earlier state.

Materials from the 20th century relate primarily to fixed-wing aircraft, although the collection does contain a tinted photographic print of Santos Dumont No. 6 (1901), as well as photographic illustrations of several 20th-century airships and dirigibles, including H.M. airship R.101 (1929) and the U.S. naval airship "Akron" (1931). The materials include a set of 6 photographic illustrations of civilian and military aircraft published in The Mentor, 1919; 18 pages of photographic illustrations of primarily British military and civilian aircraft taken from publications of the Royal United Services Institution, circa 1920-1931; and a large poster reproducing historic photographs and modern paintings by Jack Woodson of famous aircraft, 1903-1970. The materials also include large-size color lithographs of military aircraft built by Consolidated Vultee, circa 1941-1945, and of military and civilian aircraft built by Lockheed Aircraft Corp., circa 1948, as well as computer-generated renderings of a U.S. military "flying wing", circa 1980.