Media Archives - Page 8 of 22

Germany’s Wonder Weapons — V-2 Rockets

The German word was Vergeltungswaffe, which means “retribution weapon” but is normally translated as “vengeance.” Generically, the V program included a family of advanced concepts beginning with the V-1 cruise missile. The “buzz bomb” carried an 1,800 lb. warhead at around 400mph, but was susceptible to defending fighters and anti-aircraft guns. The V-2 was unlike […]

Hells Bells

Learning the Hard Way Low-altitude combat in the P-40 October 1940: Off I go into the wild blue yonder! I was the oldest of six kids growing up in Tarboro, North Carolina, and enlisted in the Army Air Corps in October 1940. I was assigned to the Third Reconnaissance Squadron in Orlando, Florida, as an aerial […]

Confessions of an Av Hoarder

Ever wonder what an editor’s office looks like? Well, as a lifelong “accumulator” of neat stuff (as opposed to a “collector” in which a theme or direction is connoted), I wholeheartedly admit that my larger-than-normal office has the moldy ambience of a hoarder’s disheveled living room. Rather than piles of discarded clothing and grandma’s kitchen […]

Rabbits Out of a Hat: Archivist Miracles

It happened twice in the same morning: The same question (more or less) was asked about World War II wristwatches. My question was first. We had just received a raft of e-mailed WW II images concerning watches from two of our most appreciated archivists: Stan Piet and Jack Cook. As I was going through the […]

Downloadable Drawing: FW-190A

Flight Journal readers are the winners when it comes to stuff being lost in our attic. Until John Dibbs offered us his fantastic photos of the Flying Heritage Collection’s one-of-a-kind, original flying FW-190A we’d never poked around in our archives to see what we had in the way of Focke-Wulf drawings. And you won’t believe […]

The Turncoat’s Raid

Our Bombers Were Led by a Japanese Officer. He was called the Benedict Arnold of Mindanao, a turncoat to the Empire of Japan. Yet few turncoats were as honorably and honestly motivated as Minoru Wada, a WW II Japanese prisoner of war, who voluntarily led an American air strike against his own military because of […]

Air Apaches

Brave Little Indians The 345th Bomb Group (BG) was first activated at Columbia Army Air Base, South Carolina, in November 1942 and was christened the “Air Apaches.” As a B-25 bomber group, it was broken into four squadrons: the 498th, known as the “Falcons”; the 499th, “Bats Outa Hell”; the 500th, “Rough Raiders”; and the […]

Superfortress Atomic Bombs: Little Boy & Fat Man

Known as Little Boy and Fat Man, the atomic bombs that the Superfortresses dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, were game changers Development of nuclear weapons began in early 1943, following years of scientific and engineering research. The Manhattan Project managers identified two methods of firing a nuclear weapon, and given the prospects for ending the […]

Silent Targets: The glider gang behind the trees

During the National WW II Glider Pilots Association’s 41st reunion in Oklahoma City in October 2011, glider pilots George L. Williams of Idaho and Norman C. Wilmeth of Oklahoma shared memories of their D-Day glider missions with the author. MISSION ELMIRA Normandy D-Day Flight Officer George L. Williams flew seven glider missions during World […]

1959 Rocket Mail Balisstic Missile- It seemed like a good idea at the time

Even in these days of the Internet, sending paper mail by airplane remains a major part of everyday life. The early efforts to build upon airmail and experiment with rocket mail, however, never quite caught on. There had been earlier efforts at home and abroad, usually over short distances and using handcrafted rockets. It all came […]