Albert Sammt-Zeppelin Museum at KULT, Hauptstrasse 52 @museum.de

M: Our Zeppelin Museum is dedicated to the life and work of Albert Sammt, who was an airship captain for 30 years. But first, we’d like to say a few words about zeppelins.

F: Zeppelins were rigid airships named after the man who designed and built them, Count Ferdinand von Zeppelin. The Zeppelinwerke had their manufacturing facility in Friedrichshafen on Lake Constance, where there’s also a Zeppelin museum. And there’s a third museum in Meersburg on Lake Constance. The airships were built between 1900 and 1940 and were used for both civil aviation and military purposes.

M: A zeppelin flight was a once-in-a-lifetime event that only wealthy passengers could afford. Flights across the Atlantic to New York were especially popular. The Atlantic crossing took about 59 hours, almost two and a half days and nights. Of course, people wanted to have a comfortable time en route. There were passenger cabins and lounges. And in the evenings, the captain invited the passengers to dine, a custom that’s now confined to cruise ships.

F: In the display cases, you can see the fine china from which the passengers ate. The tea service, a menu, and objects such as the aluminium chairs are from the LZ 130 "Graf Zeppelin II", the airship on which Albert Sammt undertook his last flight.

M: At the next stop, we’ll find out more about the man whose life was closely linked to the history of the airship: Albert Sammt.

F: But first, take a look at the Daimler engine. It commemorates an airship’s spectacular maiden flight from Lake Constance on the 2nd of July, 1900. The LZ 1 airship was propelled out of the floating assembly hall and took off from the waters of Lake Constance, powered by two Daimler engines. The zeppelin measured 128 metres or 420 feet in length and stayed aloft for exactly … 18 minutes, cheered on by tens of thousands of spectators.