(obsolete) A child's hornbook for learning the alphabet. 1802, William Hutton, The History of the Roman Wall, preface You will also pardon the errors of the Work, for you know I was not bred to letters; but, that the battledore, at an age not exceeding six, was the last book I used at school. (obsolete) A bat or beetle used in washing clothes.
The parachute, like the helicopter and the hang glider, dates back to the drawings of mankind's greatest public genius, Leonardo da Vinci.
But 100 years ago, on March 1, 1912, Berry entered a class of his own when he hopped off the axle of an early Benoist pusher biplane high above a St. Louis army base, and became the first person to jump from an airplane and land by parachute.