Memoirs Of A Pioneer Aviator

Memoirs Of A Pioneer Aviator is a record of the author's experiences in the Royal Air Force from 1924 to 1930. Here is a story of the humour and tragedy that touched the daily lives of the officers and enlisted men of the R.A.F. during that time. It is a valuable link to an era long past and a part of aviation that no longer exists outside of aviation museums. Here, also, is a story about early aircraft operations; about flying in zero visibility, sometimes in formation with other aircraft, before the advent of instrument flight regulations. It gives us a taste of the risks those aviators took and the judgement they needed to survive. This book is a must for aviation buffs. Within its pages, flight instructors will discover the origins of their trade. Terry Finney's story is a must-read for anyone interested in the history of aviation.

The memoir of the female aviator who became Hitler’s favorite pilot. The Sky My Kingdom is the fascinating autobiography of the famous World War II test pilot Hanna Reitsch. As the war progressed, Reitsch was invited to fly many of Germany’s latest—and increasingly desperate—designs, including the rocket-propelled Messerschmitt Me 163 Komet and several larger bombers, on which she tested various mechanisms for cutting barrage balloon cables. After crashing on her fifth Me 163 flight, she was badly injured but insisted on writing her report before falling unconscious and spending five months in the hospital. Eventually, she became Adolf Hitler’s favorite pilot. Reitsch was one of only two women awarded the Iron Cross First Class during World War II, and the only woman awarded the Luftwaffe Combined Pilot and Observer Badge with Diamonds. She survived many accidents and was badly injured several times. In the last days of the war, Reitsch was asked to fly her companion, Col. Gen. Robert Ritter von Greim, into Berlin to meet with Hitler. The city was already surrounded by Red Army troops, who had made significant progress into the downtown area when they arrived, landing on a city street and traveling to the Führerbunker. The aircraft she used was the justly famous Fieseler Storch, already well known for the exploit that rescued Mussolini, only adding to the legend of both Reitsch and that aircraft. She is said to have overheard Hitler laying out plans for Nazi commanders to join together in mass suicide when it was obvious that the war was over. She also hoped to fly out propaganda minister Joseph Goebbels’ six children, who had been staying in the bunker since April 22 with their parents, but neither Joseph nor Magda Goebbels would allow it. She managed to escape Berlin herself, on April 29, by flying out through heavy Russian antiaircraft fire. She was a devoted and idealistic Nazi who adored Adolf Hitler and refused to believe the reports of concentration camps and torture. Not until much later would she say that she had been “disgusted” by what she witnessed in the Third Reich. She was held for eighteen months by the American military after the war, interrogated, and subsequently released—ultimately to become a champion glider pilot, as gliders were the only craft German citizens were allowed to fly. Hers is a story that arguably stands as unique in the great drama of World War II.

When his student and close friend Oliver Smithies accepted his Nobel Prize in Medicine and Physiology, he singled Field out as someone who was important in his life, saying, "Field Morey, a distinguished flight instructor taught me to fly...but he taught me something more important than flying. He taught me that it is possible to overcome fear with knowledge." During his four years above the earth, throughout fifty-eight years of teaching more than one thousand pilots, Field overcame fear, faced weather, set records, had abundant fun...and as he puts it, "learned from my students...probably more than I taught." Since he grew up in an aviation family, it was expected that Field would fly. A contemporary of Charles Lindbergh, his father, Howard, taught him about airplanes, about operating an airport, about character and responsibility, while Lindbergh inspired him to imagine more and aim higher. Twice the FAA named Field Flight Instructor of the Year. Later, his name was added to the Wright Brothers Master Pilot Award. Along with Oliver Smithies, the pair set a world record, and when the Aviation Hall of Fame inducted him, it was a career highlight. In this memoir, Field recounts his coming-of-age in aviation and relates stories of memorable flights and remarkable adventures. With an awareness that his story is also his students' story, he recognizes the privilege of having been born when he was and pays tribute to his father, Howard Morey, an exemplary aviation pioneer, by thanking him every day for guiding him in the right direction. Yes, this is a story about flying, but it is much more. It is a study of how excellence evolves, not always in a linear progression, but with passion and vision.

A revealing look at how ordinary citizens were plucked from the hardscrabble 1930s and hurriedly turned into flyers--young men then pitted against each other in deadly machines miles above the ground in Europe. Ray Brim led the way for thousands of his compatriots in the type of "total war" in the skies that we will never see again . . .

Jet Pioneer: A Fighter Pilot's Memoir is the remarkable story of Major General Carl G. Schneider's thirty-two year U.S. Air Force career. Beginning in 1946 as a newly enlisted AAF private, he rose through the ranks to become a two star general--an accomplishment very few men in American history have ever achieved. This book is a fascinating look into the unprecedented career of a jet fighter pilot who flew one hundred combat missions in Korea and served in Vietnam flying combat missions with the VNAF. Filled with personal stories, Jet Pioneer: A Fighter Pilot's Memoir takes the reader along as the author recounts riveting combat missions, often humorous accounts of his Air Force career as well as the "gut-wrenching moments" of learning close friends were shot down by the enemy and killed or captured.

Boris Sergievsky was one of the most colorful of the early aviators. He made his first flight less than ten years after the Wright brothers made theirs; he made his last only four years before the Concorde took off. Born in Russia, Sergievsky learned to fly in 1912. In World War I, he became a much-decorated infantry officer and then a fighter pilot, battling the Austro-Hungarians. During the Russian Civil War that followed, he fought on three fronts against the Bolsheviks. Coming to America in 1923, the first job he could find in New York was with a pick and shovel, digging the Holland Tunnel, but he soon joined Igor Sikorsky’s airplane company. Over the next decade as chief test pilot for the company, he tested the Sikorsky flying boats that Pan American Airways used to establish its world-wide routes, setting seventeen world aviation records along the way. Sergievsky also flew pioneering flights across unchartered African and Latin American jungles in the 1930s, flew with Charles Lindbergh, tested early helicopters and jets, and flew his own Grumman Mallard on charter flights until 1965. Through it all, his sense of humor remained intact, as did his passion for beautiful women.

Although Amelia Earhart remains the best-known female pilot of the 1930s, Jacqueline Cochran stood as the more important aviation pioneer and America's top woman pilot. Among her many accomplishments, Cochran was the first female aviator to win the Bendix Air Race, to fly a bomber, to break the speed of sound, and to participate in astronaut training. This revealing biography explores Cochran's childhood in an impoverished Florida mill town, her early career as a pilot, and her role in creating and leading the WASPs during World War II. It also chronicles her postwar exploits, including her participation in the NASA space program, her unsuccessful 1956 bid for Congress, and her surprising reluctance to crusade for the advancement of women. This detailed profile, removing Cochran from Earhart's shadow, firmly establishes the aviatrix as a pivotal figure in the history of women in aviation and in war.