More Heroic Failures

The Museum That Described a Coin Wrongly 
In October 1971 in County Durham some people made a 
big mistake. The South Shields 
Museum 
proudly 
described one of the coins on show as a Roman 
coin. 
Miss Fiona Gordon, who was 9 years old, told them 
something about the coin that surprised them. It was, in 
fact, a plastic coin that came from a business that sold 
sweet drinks. They gave them to people who returned 
bottles to the shop. 
When they asked her to explain, she said, ‘I knew 
because I saw the letter “R” on one side of the coin.’ 
A man from the museum said, ‘The coin looks just like 
a Roman coin. We thought the letter “R” meant “Roma”. 
In fact it was “R” for Robinsons, the business that makes 
the drinks.’ 
‘The date is wrong by almost 2,000 years,’ Miss 
Gordon said helpfully. 
The Most Unsuccessful Balloon Journey 
In
 
1823 Mr Charles Green, one of the first people to 
travel in a 
balloon, 
was getting ready for one of his 
balloon journeys. He climbed into the 
basket 
and started 
the fire that lifted the balloon off the ground. The balloon 
went up slowly but the basket stayed where it was. 
Someone forgot to tic the basket to the balloon or 
perhaps they did not tie it on purpose. Mr Green and his 
friend did not want to stay in the basket, so they held on 
to the balloon. People watched the balloon as it went 
over the town of Cheltenham, with Mr Green and his 
friend still holding on underneath it. 
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The Most Unsuccessful Balloon Journey 

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The Worst Way to Light a Fire 
In 1972 Derek
 
Langbornc, from Upton, near the town of 
Didcot in England, put some pieces of wood into his 
fireplace in his living-room and began to light a fire. 
When the fire started, he went outside to get some more 
wood. 
But one piece of wood wanted to warm the room very 
quickly and fell out of the fireplace on to the floor next 
to a box of smaller pieces of wood. When Mr Langbornc 
came back, he saw that the box of wood was burning. He 
quickly carried it out into the garden. On the way out of 
the house he knocked against a jacket on the back of the 
door. By the time he came back, the jacket and the door 
were both burning. 
As soon as he lifted the telephone to call the fire station 
in Didcot he noticed that the box of wood in the garden 
was standing too near his car and that his car was now 
burning. 
He then put on his coat and ran towards his car with 
some water but on the way he knocked a tin of oil all 
over the ground. 
Seeing that Mr Langborne was busy, his neighbour 
called the fire station. By the time the firemen arrived, 
Mr Langborne’s coat was burning, too.