André-Jacques Garnerin

André-Jacques Garnerin (1769–1823) was a French aeronaut and early parachuting pioneer. He became known for making the first recorded parachute descent from a balloon, carried out in Paris in 1797. Garnerin’s parachute was a frameless canopy attached to a basket, deployed after he separated from the balloon, and his demonstrations helped popularize parachuting as a public spectacle and a practical aeronautical experiment. He continued to give ascents and parachute exhibitions in France and abroad during the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. Garnerin died in 1823, leaving a lasting place in the history of flight and aerial safety.