• Long before Hydrogen was recognized as an element and given it’s name, Robert Boyle (chemist/physicist) produced the gas in a reaction between iron filings and dilute acids. In a published paper on the reaction, he had classified the gaseous hydrogen as an, “inflammable solution of Mars” [iron].

•  LEFT: Robert Boyle at 63

• In 1766, the English chemist Henry Cavendish discovered Hydrogen in London, England. Henry hadn't made the claim that he discovered Hydrogen. The truth is, he assumed the substance to be phologistan, just as Johann Becher and Georg Stahl had thought it to be. Cavendish produced hydrogen gas in 1766 through the addition of zinc metal to hydrochloric acid. In his collection of the then called, "inflammable air from metals," over mercury, he calculated the densities of Hydrogen, air and other gases, coming to the conclusion that hydrogen was less dense than air, thus and entirely different substance from other gases. By being the first to recognize Hydrogen as a distinct substance, he supported Antoine Lavoisier's belief of gases being separate elements.  Later, Cavendish recognized that water consisted of oxygen and hydrogen.

ABOVE: The British Chemist/Physicist Henry Cavendish (1731-1810) was the first to recognize Hydrogen as a distinct substance

• BELOW: Lavoisier had named the element Hydrogen in 1788 in accordance with the greek work, hydro meaning, "water" and genes meaning, "generator" because as Hydrogen burns, it produces water. (Photo-Wolfram research)
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• Hydrogen’s unique property of being lighter than air was once put to use in keeping blimps and manned balloons afloat. Airships then abandoned the use of Hydrogen after a spark set aflame the German blimp Hindenburg May 6, 1937 in Lakehurst, New Jersey. They replaced Hydrogen’s formal use with helium because although Helium is only slightly denser, it is a safer gas to use due to it being inflammable.

Retired NASA [National Aeronautics and Space Administration] engineer and long-time hydrogen advocate Addison Bain believes "the fabric not filling of H₂ is to blame."

Click  Here to Read More on The Possible Cause for the Hindenberg Incident

(National Hydrogen Association) 

(http://www.webelements.com/webelements/elements/text/H/key.html Hydrogen Ray Tracing Image of "Ill-fated Hidenberg balloon"