Roger Ward Babson (1875 - 1967), remembered today largely for founding Babson College in Massachusetts, was an entrepreneur and business theorist in the first half of the 20th century. In 1948, he established the Gravity Research Foundation, In an essay called Gravity - Our Enemy Number One, Babson indicated that his wish to overcome gravity dated from the childhood drowning of his sister.
The foundation held occasional conferences where attendees sat in chairs with their feet higher than their heads, to counterbalance gravity. Over time, the Gravity Research Foundation shed its crank-ish air, turning its attention from trying to block gravity to trying to understand it.The Presurfer