This is a collapsible water ballast bucket from an “early airship,” such as a B-class, C- or possibly J-class. It’s made of aluminum-doped, rubberized fabric and measures 10” high by 10.5” wide. The close-up of the top shows a small, round collapsible fabric opening which has a fine metal-mesh strainer. The bucket is meant to be dunked into a lake or ocean so that water fills it through the half-open top and can then be used as ballast aboard an airship as well as quickly poured out when no longer needed. It also may have been used to hoist aboard fuel oil, atleast for C-class airships. A photo below of C-3 annotated on the front “Dirigible taking on oil” has written on the reverse “Arrow shows container holding 10 gal of motor oil being hoisted on board for use of motors. Line attached to same may readily be distinguished...,” an example of early in-flight refueling. The 5 airship photos shown are, in this order, (1) a C-3 in 1920 hauling up motor oil (2) two men fishing from a ‘Pony’ blimp in 1920 with water ballast buckets beneath them, (3) the car of a B-class airship, (4) an army TC-1 airship in 1923, and (5) J-3 and J-4 taking off from N.A.S. Lakehurst in 1928. The U.S. Navy airship J-3 took off from N.A.S. Lakehurst on January 5, 1928, with 5 aboard including T.G.W. ‘Tex’ Settle in command. Both engines stopped because the fuel lines from the overhead fuel storage tank to the gravity-fed tank was "clogged with ice," the author explains. To get fuel directly to one of the gravity-fed tanks, Settle decided to drain fuel from the storage tank and put it right into the gravity-fed tank, bypassing the clogged fuel line. The book goes on to say "The J-3 carried a canvas bucket for use in picking up seawater for ballast. Opening a drain cock at the bottom of one of the storage tanks - with great difficulty, it turned out - fuel was drained, bucket by bucket, and hand- poured into the gravity tank." (p. 48, J. Gordon Vaeth, They sailed the skies: U.S. Navy balloons and the Airship Program). J-3 in the background and J-4 up front are seen taking-off from N.A.S. Lakehurst in 1928. The entire group includes the bucket plus its round case with a snap closure, also made of aluminum-doped ruberized fabric, the two original notes and a copy of the book cited above. Note that the bucket is no longer collapsible. From the Joan Reisig Collection. Joan Reisig's obituary states that she “worked for engineering firms in Cleveland and the Akron area before working for Goodyear Aerospace as a design draftsman in advanced airships. Also, at the Wingfoot Lake Blimp Base for a total of 20 years. She was associated with the Lighter than Air Society” (Akron Beacon Journal, March 25, 2019). Later in her career she was the archivist for the Engineering Department of the Airship Support Group at Goodyear.