May 2019

Aviation History

Aviation History Magazine is an authoritative, in-depth history of world aviation from its origins to the Space Age

Aviation History4 min read
Mailbag
Barrett Tillman’s Topgun story [March 2019] was predictably well written, with his usual knowledge and strong point of view. During my first two-week Navy Reserve trip out to Miramar in 1973 with VFP-306 with its RF-8G Crusaders, I happened to be the
Aviation History2 min read
Lincoln-page Chicken Coop Find
Like George Washington’s hatchet, many vintage aircraft have gone through so many changes, modifications, updates and improvements that it’s hard to tell what’s real and what’s Memorex. Engines get swapped out. Propellers are modernized. Brakes are a
Aviation History1 min read
X-15’s First Flight
Sixty years ago, the X-15 superspeed era began when, on June 8, 1959, a diminutive North American Aviation rocket plane—50 feet long and with a 22-foot wingspan—was affixed to a B-52 mother ship for a captive-carry first flight. Three months later, t
Aviation History4 min read
Wright Place At The Right Time
“I was a person of good fortune,” said Ken Chilstrom, 97, during a recent interview at the Freedom Museum in Manassas, Va. “First at Wright Field, then Muroc, the forerunner of Edwards Air Force Base.” If good fortune indeed propelled Chilstrom’s avi
Aviation History4 min read
The Last Typhoon
Late in November 2018, the Royal Air Force Museum in Hendon, England, put its Hawker Typhoon Mark IB, serial no. MN235, back on static display. Although it is not slated to fly, the museum has good reason not to risk it, for in one respect it is the
Aviation History2 min read
Style
ARCHITECTURE High on a plateau in California’s Ventura County is a unique residence dubbed the 747 Wing House, designed using the wings of a decommissioned Trans World Airlines Boeing 747-100 (N93106). American architect David Randall Hertz and his a
Aviation History2 min readAviation & Aeronautics
X-citing Times
The postwar era extending through the 1950s is rightly remembered as a time of rapid aviation innovation, as aircraft designers developed new technologies and test pilots pushed the flight envelope to Mach 1 and beyond. Beginning with the Bell X-1’s
Aviation History4 min read
First To Mach 3
The story of Chuck Yeager breaking the sound barrier in a Bell X-1 is well known to aviation enthusiasts and the general public alike (though Yeager had plenty of help—see P. 44). But much of the history of transonic and supersonic flight testing rem
Aviation History1 min read
Bog Spitfire Recovered
The wreckage of a rare Supermarine Spitfire Mark I, disarmed and modified to extend its range to nearly 2,000 miles for its photoreconnaissance (PR) role, was recently discovered on a Norwegian mountainside. Like a Grumman Hellcat found there earlier
Aviation History11 min read
Ak-47 Of The Air
WHILE THE UNITED STATES WAS CRANKING OUT CENTURY SERIES FIGHTERS, ALL SPECTACULAR BUT NONE PARTICULARLY EFFECTIVE IN THE ROLE FOR WHICH THEY WERE INTENDED, THE SOVIET UNION QUIETLY CAME UP WITH A WEAPON OF ENORMOUS CAPABILITY, PERFORMANCE, ECONOMY AN
Aviation History11 min read
The Indestructible Ace
LIEUTENANT (J.G.) ALEXANDER VRACIU WAS ONE FRUSTRATED FIGHTER PILOT. ON JUNE 19, 1944—THE BIGGEST DAY OF AIR COMBAT IN THE PACIFIC WAR—HIS GRUMMAN F6F-3 HELLCAT STRUGGLED TO KEEP PACE WITH THE REST OF FIGHTER SQUADRON 16. The “Fighting Airedales” had
Aviation History11 min read
Forgotten Whirlybird
“SIKORSKY WAS THE FIRST TO MAKE HELICOPTERS PRACTICAL,” WROTE AVIATION EXPERT C.V. GLINES, “BUT HE WAS PRECEDED IN HIS SUCCESSES BY OTHER SCIENTISTS AND INVENTORS WHOSE FAILURES AND DISCOVERIES CONTRIBUTED TO HIS ULTIMATE TRIUMPH.” Among the most imp
Aviation History8 min read
Sabrejet Secrets
IN THE SPRING OF 1953, WHILE I WAS A U.S. AIR FORCE PILOT WITH THE 4TH FIGHTER INTERCEPTOR WING (FIW) IN SOUTH KOREA, THE NEW AND IMPROVED NORTH AMERICAN F-86F SABRE BEGAN TO ARRIVE IN FIGHTER UNITS. Along with increased engine thrust and certain aer
Aviation History11 min read
Dropping The Orange Beast
DURING THE PAST 70 YEARS, NUMEROUS BOOKS, ARTICLES, DOCUMENTARIES AND MOVIES HAVE TOLD THE STORY OF HOW U.S. AIR FORCE PILOT CHUCK YEAGER BROKE THE SOUND BARRIER IN A BELL X-1 ON OCTOBER 14, 1947. But Yeager was far from alone in his pursuit of that
Aviation History1 min read
Reviews
> Fighter pilot turned aviation author Dan Hampton has applied his impressive experience at the controls of high-performance aircraft and his considerable wordsmithing talent to the oft-told adventure of pushing the supersonic envelope. Readers may b
Aviation History2 min read
Tupolev Tu-16
Versatile Cold War Bomber by Yefim Gordon, Dmitriy Komissarov and Vladimir Rigmant, Schiffer Publishing, 2017, $79.99. The years since the end of the Cold War have witnessed a major relaxation in the veil of secrecy that formerly shrouded the Soviet
Aviation History1 min read
Bell X-2
by Peter E. Davies, Osprey Publishing, 2017, $20. The sixth book in the highly regarded Osprey series on X-planes undertakes the daunting task of describing the esoteric and idiosyncratic Bell X-2 rocket plane. British author Peter Davies, well known
Aviation History1 min read
Vought Sb2u Vindicator
by Steve Ginter and Joe Weathers Jr., Ginter Books, 2018, $52.95. Number 106 in the successful Naval Fighters series, this new book from prodigious publisher Steve Ginter is one of the few dedicated to a Vought dive bomber that saw very little combat
Aviation History2 min read
Sky Girls
The True Story of the First Women’s Cross-Country Air Race by Gene Nora Jessen, Sourcebooks, 2018, $15.99. Aviation’s Golden Age between the two world wars was a time of enormous growth in the science and technology of flight. Records for speed, alti
Aviation History1 min read
Mystery Ship
Match the Grumman F6F pilot with his claim to fame. A. Frank E. SchneiderB. Hamilton McWhorter IIIC. James A. WarrenD. Eugene R. HanksE. David S. McCampbellF. Robert BairdG. Eugene A. Valencia Jr.H. William H.I. AtkinsonI. Wayne MorrisJ. William E. H
Aviation History2 min read
Royal Bavarian Jagdstaffel 23
by Bruno Schmäling and Winfried Bock, translated by Adam M. Wait, Aeronaut Books, 2018, $69.95. Years ago, while I was contacting and interviewing every French World War I airman I could find, a Bavarian colleague, Bruno Schmäling, was doing the same
Aviation History1 min read
Seven At Santa Cruz
The Life of Fighter Ace Stanley “Swede” Vejtasa by Ted Edwards, Naval Institute Press, 2018, $29.95. The name “Swede” Vejtasa is familiar to serious students of Pacific War carrier operations, but many have yearned to know more about this U.S. Navy p

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