Book Description
Aviation historian William Althoff tells the story of the U.S. Navy’s airship, USS Los Angeles, the most successful aircraft of its type ever flown. In dramatic detail, Althoff recounts how the U.S. Navy arranged for the famed German Zeppelin Company to build the ship, thwarted schemes by the U.S. Army’s Air Service to take control of it, and helped plan its record-breaking, historic four-day flight from Germany to the United States. After years of experiments meant to determine its military and commercial application, the airship ultimately failed to command a consensus in the Navy. “Relegated to a lower tier,” Althoff writes, “the rigid type receded to marginal relevance until, on the eve of World War Two, it vanished altogether.” In this book, the early achievements and unceremonious demise of the Los Angeles after a long career symbolize the airship’s unfulfilled promise. Nonetheless, the operational record of this one machine altered American naval aeronautics and greatly influenced transoceanic commercial air transport during a critical period of its development.
Customer Reviews:
From a Little Known Time of Navy Air History.......2006-04-16
Everyone knows about the Hindenburg and it's famous fire. People interested in airships know about the other failures such as the Macon and Shenandoah. Above them all, however, was the Los Angeles.
Built at the Zeppelin factory after World War I, this ship sailed the Atlantic and became an official Navy ship. In the early days of air craft technology it flew more than 300 flights, over 4,000 hours in the air, almost without incident. It taught us a lot about the design and operation of lighter than air aircraft.
This book is a complete history of the Los Angeles, but perhaps even more important, it fits the Los Angeles into the overall development of aviation during the years between the world wars. Here is a discussion on other lighter than air machines, and also on the developments in heavier than air conventional planes. This was the time when the Langley was built.
This was also the time of the battleship admirals who saw nothing of any value in operating in the air. This attitude would last until a little incident at Pearl Harbor.
The saddest part of the book is the section on the dismantling of the airship. On 24 October 1939 the Los Angeles was stricken from the active Navy ship list. Disassembly began immediately. Cdr. Jesse L. Kenworthy, Jr. was anxious to complete the project, and with on fanfare. He said that he was concerned with "the approaching need for additional hangar space." Selling it as scrap gave the Navy less than $4,000. So was destroyed an important piece of history.
Book Description
In a time when the Industrial Revolution has become an all-out war, Mad Science rules the World...with mixed success. At Transylvania Polygnostic University, Agatha Clay was a student with trouble concentrating and rotten luck. Dedicated to her studies but unable to build anything that actually worked, she seemed destined for a lackluster career as a minor lab assistant. But then the University was overthrown and Agatha was taken aboard the giant airship Castle Wulfenbach - where it begins to look like she might carry a spark of Mad Science after all.
Customer Reviews:
The fun continues in volume 2.......2007-08-30
Great fun, as are all of the Heterodyne books - I especially appreciate the "overdrawn poking-fun-at-Gothic" artwork throughout, and the "biographies" of the contributors. On a side note, thanks to these, one of my friends is actually trying to build a dirigible... oh well!
One slight problem with several of the Girl Genius volumes - the binding is very weak, and I've actually had to get Amazon to replace this one, as it fell apart when I opened it. Luckily, Amazon is simple and easy, and this one isn't their fault - the publisher is being scrooge-ish with their glue. Examine carefully when they arrive, and don't hesitate to send them back for replacements. This series is too good, and too compulsively readable to miss! (or to suffer with bad copies... )
Mad Science was never so fun..........2007-08-13
Return to the world of adventure, romance, airships, mad scientists and power hungry Nobles. Agatha Clay, now on the giant airship Castle Wulfenbach, wishes she could leave. Pretending to be the lover of a soldier while surrounded by monsters, angry constructs and talking cats is not her idea of fun.
But getting away isn't as easy as it might look when traveling thousands of feet about the ground while hostage to one of the most powerful men in Europe!
Great stuff.......2007-05-16
Phil and Kaja Foglio are marvelous. Girl Genius has an engaging, complex plot line; intriguing premise; characters full of personality; and great art - detailed, beautiful, very expressive, and always keep an eye out for what's going on in the background. There is lots of humor in the Foglios' work, with the text and art working together perfectly. The only downside is waiting for the next volume to be published!
Another excellent book that deepens the field.......2006-10-26
This second collection is just as good as the first one (while there are certain aspects that are better, the "raw fun" of the first one is a little more controlled here). There is little I can say to praise it enough that has not been covered in the other reviews or in the description, but I do want to point out something that makes me love this series.
While Girl Genius starts out as sort of a silly story with an odd cast, it quickly exposes one of its themes: the nature of legend versus truth. In this second volume, we begin to see more and more of the legends that build up the world. In contrast, we get more and more hints that legends do not always tell the story as it truly happens. This juxtaposition between belief and reality plays an important part in the storytelling method. False thing become increasingly chipped away at, enabling a story that seemingly is given away at the start a chance to actually grow and mature. Though we are told in Volume 1 what will end up happening, we quicly learn that there is a big divide in the legends and the reality which brings them about.
You end up becoming entranced, nervous, even though you know "the outcome".
Great fun, this series.
Steampunk Silliness.......2006-09-06
I really enjoyed this comic, which is an unpretentious, clever, and fun story; something too uncommon in comics these days! However I can't rate it as a major work, and the art is only "good enough."
Agatha "Clay" unsuspectedly has mad scientist ("spark") abilities; desireable in a 19th-century-ish Europe where the princelings of the 100 Years War are all mad scientists with steampunk war engines. This adventure, part II of the series, finds Agatha a prisoner in the zeppelin/fortress of Baron von Wulfenbach and his son Gil, where she is mistaken as the girlfriend of a soldier mistaken as the inventor of her inventions! Adventure, danger, and romance intertwine as she makes sense of her new surroundings and finds clues to her true identity (which, by the by, isn't QUITE discovered in this volume, nor are her "spark" talents more than suspected - by the other characters!)
The Foglios do a first-class plotting and storytelling job here, and especial kudos for a part II that stands on its own! The art is humor-manga style, and acceptable if unremarkable. IMHO, however, the artist (McNabb?) drops the ball on opportunities to have fun with some of Phil's silly inventiveness. I was also not impressed by Agatha regularly awakening (after sleep-inventing) in nightwear of the babydoll/merry widow variety.
A 6-page stand-alone story, "Spark of the Realm", is also included. Trelawney Thorpe, a 19th-C Lara Croft, must outwit a mad scientist seeking the powerful crown of King Arthur. The story is ok and the art a bit better than the main feature.
I'd strongly recommend this volume to anyone who enjoys comic manga, fantasy, or steampunk.
Average customer rating:
- Adventures galore!
- Airborn
- Airborn Review
- Airborn
- Excellent read!
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Airborn
Kenneth Oppel
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Red Kayak
ASIN: 0060531827
Release Date: 2005-05-24 |
Book Description
Sailing toward dawn, and I was perched atop the crow's nest, being the ship's eyes. We were two nights out of Sydney, and there'd been no weather to speak of so far. I was keeping watch on a dark stack of nimbus clouds off to the northwest, but we were leaving it far behind, and it looked to be smooth going all the way back to Lionsgate City. Like riding a cloud. . . .
Matt Cruse is a cabin boy on the Aurora, a huge airship that sails hundreds of feet above the ocean, ferrying wealthy passengers from city to city. It is the life Matt's always wanted; convinced he's lighter than air, he imagines himself as buoyant as the hydrium gas that powers his ship. One night he meets a dying balloonist who speaks of beautiful creatures drifting through the skies. It is only after Matt meets the balloonist's granddaughter that he realizes that the man's ravings may, in fact, have been true, and that the creatures are completely real and utterly mysterious.
In a swashbuckling adventure reminiscent of Jules Verne and Robert Louis Stevenson, Kenneth Oppel, author of the best-selling Silverwing trilogy, creates an imagined world in which the air is populated by transcontinental voyagers, pirates, and beings never before dreamed of by the humans who sail the skies.
Customer Reviews:
Adventures galore!.......2007-08-31
Can it be, perhaps, that there's a "sci-fi" book that takes place in the past? Well, for that, you need to classify "Airborn" as science fiction, which it's not. Then again, it's not historical fiction either. So what is it? A pure adventure tale, and a wonderful one at that.
"Airborn" presents us with a world of blimps, airships, and wondrous things. Our main character, Matt Cruse, is first introduced to us as the brave, talented kid who saves a man from a balloon that's about to crash. This encounter with the dying man means that one year on, Matt joins forces with a stubborn girl, determined to discover and prove the existence of a new species that her grandfather (the dying man) wrote of in his journals.
"Airborn" seems to take place in the past. Kate de Vries (our girl main character) is forced to travel with a chaperon, is constantly told what's appropriate for girls, and is considered strange for her spunk and attitude. There are incredible class differences, and that's one of the more interesting aspects of "Airborn", one that's not so obvious.
Perhaps the only flaw "Airborn" really has is that Matt seems to get out of too many tight squeezes. He is immensely talented when it comes to airships, seemingly knowing EVERYTHING. This tendency made me raise my eyebrows a few times, but then again, it's his job. Matt is a rather simple character, just a boy who loves the sky and loves flying. Kate is a good example of a girl who goes out of her way to do what she wants (spoiled, stubborn, and determined) and is determined to know everything and succeed. Their dialogue is always interesting and keeps the story moving.
"Airborn" moves at a quick, exciting pace. It's impossible to put down, even for a moment. It's a superb adventure tale that keeps moving and will keep you entertained till the very end. Wonderfully written and exciting, "Airborn" is a great read.
Highly recommended.
Airborn.......2007-06-09
This book RULES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! It is about a boy named Matt who is a cabin boy on the Aurora,a luxury airship.It is very good and the action keeps going and going.I recommend this book to anyone who likes action ,adventure and airships.So what are you waiting for? GO BUY IT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Airborn Review.......2007-04-13
Airborn, by Kenneth Oppel, is about the adventures of Matt Cruse, a cabin boy on the luxury airship Aurora. Matt proves his mettle by saving a sick balloonist, from whom he learns of unbelievable creatures. A later voyage finds Matt and his crew airshipwrecked on an uncharted island infested with the strange creatures, and pirates; it is up to Matt to save the passengers and crew.
My favorite part of the book is when Matt and his friends defeat the pirates. The final fight scene is relatively generic, but the exciting part is when the main characters must get back onto the grounded airship. Matt had been ordered to go ashore, but he and Kate De Vries (a passenger) were held prisoner by the pirates until they escaped. Having rejoined another crew member, they learn that armed pirates have boarded the ship and taken the passengers and crew hostage. Matt forms a plan to sneak onto the airship and overwhelm the pirates.
I would definately recommend the book Airborn to anyone who enjoys adventure stories. The setting is very interesting, seeing as how the story takes place in a world that is similar, but not the same, to ours. There are many different concepts, materials, and regulations in this semi-made-up world. Slow, unmanuverable, very large, and full of rich passengers, luxury liners such as the Aurora make perfect targets for pirates. This exciting air world sets up great adventures.
Airborn.......2007-04-10
Airborn was an outstanding book! I can't wait to read the sequel, Skybreaker. If you like books that have alot of adventure, excitement and are hard to put down,you are sure to love this book. Cabin boy, Matt Curse, and Kate de Vries go on many adventures while traveling on the Aurora (the airship). They encounter pirates, find mysterious bones, get chased by a cloud cat, and more. At the beginning of the book Matt spots an air balloon heading towards the ocean. Matt volunteers to jump over and when he gets inside he finds the pilot unconscious and revives him. He tells Matt about these amazing beautiful creatures he saw. Soon after, he dies in the hospital. Matt doesn't think anything of it until this girl named Kate comes aboard the Aurora. She is the granddaughter of the man that died in the hospital and she believes all the stuff that her grandpa saw is true. Are there really winged mysterious creatures? Will they survive their journey? Read Airborn to find out!
Excellent read!.......2007-03-28
Reads easy and quick, sucks you right in. Immediately you are caught up in the story of the young, and poor, cabin boy who works among the rich and drawn into the story with Oppel's skilled hand. A read page turner towards the end that you will not want to put it down. So good I made an extra trip to the library for the second novel.
A great, quick, interesting read!
Book Description
Applicants studying for the Private Pilot Knowledge Exam will find answers and explanations for every question in the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) exam database in this guide. All of the more than 900 questions from the exam are arranged by subject category and are accompanied by specific study material. Each question is followed by the answer, an explanation of the answer, and a reference and subject code for further study in FAA materials. Basic aerodynamics, engine operation, flight instruments, performance, radio navigation, and meteorology are among the subjects covered.
Customer Reviews:
Great Focused Book for Private Pilot Written.......2007-07-01
I used this book along with the free online questions at Sportys when preparing for my Private Pilot written exam. This book does an excellent and very efficient job at summarizing all you need to know to answer the questions and then providing the questions/answers grouped by topic - with occasional explanation. I scored a 98 - needlessly got one question wrong. This book really helped me prep and I used ASA to sign me off for the exam.
Note - this book is not a substitute for learning and understanding all the information required to safely fly. It is efficient memorization and focus on the test questions. You really need and want to understand everything behind the questions/answers.
I just passed the checkride this past week. Again, this book helped in reviewing fro the oral portion of the exam.
Average customer rating:
- Fiction that explodes like a bottle rocket
- good short story collection
- all-in-all very good, yet something irked me . . .
- They loved her at the Bargain Barn...
- fell flat, flat
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Airships
Barry Hannah
Manufacturer: Grove Press
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Book Description
Now considered a contemporary classic, Airships was honored by Esquire magazine with the Arnold Gingrich Short Fiction Award. The twenty stories in this collection are a fresh, exuberant celebration of the new American South — a land of high school band contests, where good old boys from Vicksurg are reunited in Vietnam and petty nostalgia and the constant pain of disappointed love prevail. Airships is a striking demonstration of Barry Hannah's mature and original talent.
Customer Reviews:
Fiction that explodes like a bottle rocket.......2006-12-06
I can always tell a great book by the fact I'm constantly thinking of bits I'd like to steal while reading. By that criteria, reading Airships was like being tossed in a jewlery store at night without any security around.
Airships is a collection of stories about war, sex, airplanes and horses. The usual, but done with incredible style and energy. I find that far too much modern short fiction is so polished and calculated it comes out as a dulled diamond (or more often polished stone), but Hannah's work is full of the rough, gritty, loose writing that draws you in like possessed jungle vines and then you get attacked by a Panther or something.
A few of the stories fall short and at least one didn't work at all for me, but I'll still give it a big ol' A+
good short story collection.......2006-02-21
If you're about to choose your first Barry Hannah book, buy this one to see what all of the fuss has been about all of these years.
all-in-all very good, yet something irked me . . ........2004-07-08
I admired this collection a lot. It is filled with beautiful, mostly inventive writing that features a collective whoop of good humor. Hannah is a sharp and strong and quite powerful writer and he has an ability to strip away characters until they are a raw,bloody pulp. He sees and knows and condemns these people too well, like he knows too much of this stuff and has spent all his life in contempt. This isn't, necessarily, a bad thing, and in Hannah's able hands many of the stories are legitimate treats, comprehension be damned!
But the sore root of this collection (aside from our individual tastes) is the sometimes clamouring of a drunken voice (probably legitimately drunken and occasionally veering into misunderstanding) that has some great things to say but too often finds itself distracted by an irritating minutiea. Sure, the blood and the sadness give several of these tales a needed visceral edge, the kind of voice that drags you there into the eye of the beast that is man. At other times the figures are too literal parodies, muscousy germs that struggle in the petry dish of the frequently cruel author's imagination.
In the end I would definately recommend Airships for the consistantly far-reaching attempts that these little stories of nobodies set out to explore--four or five of them I thought were absolutely wonderful. I would just offer a casual warning that a certain stretch may come when you're tired of trying so hard and find yourself simply not caring about what happens next. This is a very human reaction and one that is usually offered with the sometime forgiveness of a desire to someday return to such potential. This is a book to look over when in a mood of focused patience when you are willing to spend a week or two starting and stopping through a few pictures of hilarious misery that are warped at the edges by an ambitious refrain.
They loved her at the Bargain Barn..........1999-11-23
A wonderful collection of stories that made me laugh outloud more than anything since the first time I read Celine. From one story to the next I was trully captivated. What sets him apart from other writers is his T.S. Eliot - like gift to come up with phrases that ring in your head like coins for years to come. No writer ever has been able to sum up a character in a single sentence like Hannah. Her husband was an intellectual in real estate... etc. The same is true in other volumes. Latouche (with metaphysical approaches named after him), is a good example.
I am not yet published but have written nine novels and hope my day will come soon. Hannah along with Richard Ford, Cormack McCarthy, Flaubert, Rilke, Celine, and Peter Handke, are my all-time favorites. Thanks for the inspiration!
fell flat, flat.......1999-10-25
I had to read and reread and reread many of these stories in order to understand that there was nothing to understand. I have no idea what he was attempting to do, or if he attempted and did what he planned to do, I had no idea what it was he did. "Testimony of Pilot" was probably the only normal story in this collection. And I'll admit, it was a damn fine story. It amounted to twelve dollars for one story, and, that, for me, didn't feel worth it. Or maybe I'm just stupid--maybe ever story made perfect literary sense. As an avid reader of Raymond Carver, I am not easily impressed by short stories, since, being an English Major and a student of writing and Carver, I have certian expectations of short story writers. For one, don't be too literary--I get enough of Lit BS from going to class, and second, don't try to showboat or reinvent the short story. Or maybe I'm just ignorant--that could be it!
Customer Reviews:
THE book to buy on the subject.......2004-05-04
It's a real shame that this book is out of print as it is the definitive work on the subject of the US Navy's flying aircraft carriers. Well written, very well illustrated, it is truly comprehensive. From design, to flight operations, to the evolution of its mission this book covers them all and covers them well. It also covers the never produced follow-up designs that you won't find references for anywhere else, they even have drawings of them.
I don't give many "5"s for books, this one deserves it. The author is to be congratulated for doing this fine a job. This is one of the few books where I wasn't wishing for more detail or information in any section because they are already comprehensive and yet entertaingly written.
Book Description
Applicants studying for the Private Pilot Knowledge Exam will find answers and explanations for every question in the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) exam database in this guide. All of the more than 900 questions from the exam are arranged by subject category and are accompanied by specific study material. Each question is followed by the answer, an explanation of the answer, and a reference and subject code for further study in FAA materials. Basic aerodynamics, engine operation, flight instruments, performance, radio navigation, and meteorology are among the subjects covered.
Customer Reviews:
FAA Knowlage Exam.......2006-06-28
you people who are trying to become come pilots keep up the good work its a joy when you become a pilot the HARD work really does payoff trust me!!!! this is a great book the study for your knowlage exam i highley recomend it it gives you all the details digrams and alot of others if you buy this book i recomend the privat pilot oral prep. like i said agian keep up the good work student pilot soon to become a private pilot .
Private Pilot Test prep.......2006-02-21
This book is extremely helpful for passing the FAA exam. I highly recommend it!
Customer Reviews:
4.5 stars - An excellent book.......2004-10-24
Golden Age Of The Great Passenger Airships: Graf Zeppelin And Hindenburg (1992.) A book by Harold G. Dick.
INTRODUCTION:
In the late 1800s and the first third of the 1900s, Zeppelins ruled the skies. Before commercial airline travel became heavily used by airplanes, it was the airships that transported people across vast distances. They were also used by the military as scouts and even flying aircraft carriers. By far, the two most popular of these airships were the Graf Zeppelin, which circumnavigated the earth in 1929, and the Hindenburg, whose disasterous crash on May 6, 1937, became one of the most famous air disasters of all time. Many a book has been written on the subject over the years, including this one by Harold G. Dick, a man who collected data back in the golden age. Read on for my review of this book.
SYNOPSIS:
Mr. Dick has no shortage of airship data, and in this book, he presents it all. The book's title is somewhat misleading, in that it is not limited to the history of the two airships contained within it. The book covers the entire history of the rigid airship program, from its birth in the late 1800s, right down to its downfall in the early 1940s. An assortment of facts, mathematical charts, diagrams, photos, and other pieces of information all come together in the book to tell the story.
OPINIONS:
In my opinion, Mr. Dick compiled his information very well. One of the greatest advantages of this book over other ones of the same type is that Dick was alive at the time of the rigid airship program, and he had a chance to collect data and even meet many of the men involved. I do have a few minor complaints, though. For one thing, the information is not organized in any particular order. This makes reading through the book somewhat confusing if you lack knowledge of the information. Also, the book is writted from Dick's own point of view, and not from a broader, more general perspective. Because of this he tends to ramble about his own life at times. Still, this are only small complaints. Where else are you gonna find a listing of what different airship pilots/employees were supposed to wear for their jobs? I strongly recommend this book to anyone who is interested in the rigid airships of the past.
OVERALL:
Overall, I am satisfied with this book. Harold G. Dick is a man who knows what he's talking about, and in this book, he really lets it show. Many books have been published about this subject, and this is one of the finest. No rigid airship enthusiast should be without this book.
Best job in the world.......2003-03-01
Harold Dick wrote an enticing account of his time with the great airships. He had complete access to the entire program. They even let him assume flight control resposibilities. The right man was in the right place at the right time.
An excellent book.......2001-07-31
An excellent book that appropriately combines historical, technical, and personal detail.
Belongs in the Library of Every Zeppelin Enthusiast.......2001-07-26
As Goodyear's liason to the Zeppelin Company, Harold G. Dick had unprecedented access to the ships, the information, and the people who defined this "golden age." He speaks with authtority because he was there. He can relate unique statistics on the performance of the Hindenberg in trans-Atlantic flight because he flew as a officer/observer. He speaks about the personalities of Dr. Hugo Eckner, the chairman of Zeppelin, and his son Knut, because he enjoyed the friendship of both. He also touches upon the rise of the Nazi Party, since he was a direct witness to propoganda flights (and some more harrowing events). (His photographs of the damage sustained by the Hindenberg as it attempted to lift off on such a flight are unique; Nazi officials confiscated all others, but he managed to hide his film.) His access was unique, and so therefore is this book.
One of the best........1999-05-28
One of the best airship books written as the author was directly involved in all aspects of the zeppelin program. No book written so far exceeds this one in illuminating the operations and organization of the passenger airship effort. Pictures never before seen are included. The story is told in context with the political situation of the time. A must read book.
Customer Reviews:
This Book is a Steal - Get It!.......2005-01-16
I have had this book for over 5 years. When I compare what I paid for it then to how cheaply it is available now, it's a no-brainer...GET IT, especially if you find one in good condition with a nice dust-jacket.
This book is intended to be a BRIEF overview of airships, with a lot of pictures. It's a nice coffee-table type book. Perhaps it is a bit mis-titled, because it deals with many other airships before the "Hindenburg." I would estimate that only 1/4 of the book deals with the "Hindenburg" per se.
This book does not go into great detail about each era, but it will talk about pre-WWI airships and Count Zeppelin, a tiny bit on non-rigids and semi-rigids, WWI airship operations, British rigid experiments (the R-100 and R-101), the "Norge" North Pole trip, the American Rigids (The "Shenandoah" "Akron" and "Macon"), and it spends a lot of time talking about the "Hindenburg's" immediate predecessor, the "Graf Zeppelin," as well as Hugo Eckener, the man who took over after Count Zeppelin passed away.
There are so many beautiful and fascinating pictures and paintings of these airships. The paintings are in color, contributing to giving the reader a good understanding of what these magnificent giants looked like.
Don't expect a lot of detail on each airship; it always leaves me wanting to know more. But again, the design of the book is to give just a brushstroke of the airship era, which it does very very well.
I am a semi-buff on airships, and I would NEVER get rid of this book. It is especially good if you just want an introduction on the era. If you are looking for a more "meaty" book on the subject, you will have to find one that deals with a particular airship or era. For German WWI airships, I highly recommend "The Zeppelin in Combat...A History of the German Naval Airship Division 1912-1918" by Douglas Robinson.
This would be the book to start with on the subject of airships. WELL WORTH THE PRICE!!!
Magical Era.......2003-05-31
This is the definitive history of the Airship from it's creation to it's untimely demise and of the future.
The Hindenburg has always fascinated people and the it's firey ending at the Lakehurst is now part of aviation fokelore.
This book plots the track of the Airship and mainly focuses on the Rigid Airship and it's humble beginings on Lake Constance, it's role in the First World War and life before the Second.
As typical of Archbold's works, it is beautifully illustrated throughout and is full of all the technical data needed to understand these magnificent machines.
All nations that developed the Airship are covered and their failings are all laid out to bare. The British experience reads of arrogance and even when the great Dr Hugo Eckner offered his assistance, they turned him down. The United States pushed the envelope too far and even though they had the most modern Airships to date, sadly they too would be put off developing a transport network.
In the end it would be Germany with it's conservatisim and experience that would see out the great Airship era with the globetrotting LZ127 Graf Zeppelin and LZ129 Hindenburg, it's life cut short by that tragic day in 1937. If helium had been used, flights would have continued with the last Airship, the new Graf Zepplin LZ130 and it was used for recon flights just before war was going to break out. When the end came, it was swift and sudden and the great Airship era was over.
History of the Hindenburg & Other Airships.......2001-03-16
To this day, I don't know why I am so fascinated with the Hindenburg, but I do know that she is an amazing airship to study. Her firey crash as well as some other famous crashes (Macon, Akron, Shenandoah, etc.) are discussed, in detail, in this book. So it's not just the Hindenburg's history, but the whole history of airships in general, right down to the present day Goodyear blimp. I've absolutely enjoyed reading this book cover to cover because of the history that has been detailed throughout the career of the airships of the past. "Hindenburg: The Illustrated History" is worth getting for anybody who loves airships or history's great disasters.
Outstanding!.......2000-11-30
A beautiful (nay, sumptuous) oversized book that bedazzles with both its original paintings and its endless historical illustrations and photographs; but also an excellent introduction to the history of airships, in all countries (that the book is titled "Hindenburg" is unfortunate, as the Hindenburg herself figures into only a small portion of the book). Full but not overwhelming coverage of wartime Zeps is a plus. Both the historian and the fan of 30s art will be deeply pleased.
Why isn't this is print?.......2000-05-17
Truly a great book on the by-gone era of airships. Copiously illustrated, "The Hindenburg - An Illustrated History" teaches the reader not only about the one airship that everyone remembers, but also about airships in general.
Count Zeppelin was the grandfather of the Hindenburg, but other designers are chronicled here. Germany, England, and the US all have their airship histories summarized.
The paintings bring to life an age that will never come again . . . when the airship ruled the skies.
Look for this book in auctions if you have any interest in airships.
Amazon.com
Since the explosion of the Hindenburg in Lakehurst, New Jersey, energy-efficient, lighter-than-air ships have given way to gas-guzzling jet aircraft. But in the 1960s, an unusual band of inventors, engineers and investors, again in New Jersey, created the Aereon, a strange, wingless hybrid airplane/dirigible. The Aereon--the Deltoid Pumpkin Seed-- promised to be a safe workhorse of the skies, capable of carrying the payload of entire freight trains with minimal cost.
In this exquisitely crafted tale of back-to-the-drawing-board perseverance, McPhee tells the story not only of the Aereon, but of any product development team. He astutely delineates the team members' personalities and interactions, delves back in time to the origins of lighter-than-air craft and the history of propellers, and in the end, makes us wonder why this promising technology hasn't been perfected. Like Aramis: Or the Love of Technology, this is a splendid book about a potentially superior aircraft which has yet to be adopted.
Book Description
This is the fascinating story of the dream of a completely new aircraft, a hybrid of the plane and the rigid airship - huge, wingless, moving slowly through the lower sky. John McPhee chronicles the perhaps unfathomable perseverance of the aircraft's sucessive progenitors.
Customer Reviews:
Weird, prolix prose.......2006-07-09
I was disappointed to find the book has almost nothing to do with Solomon Andrews, he only rates five pages. Most of it is the mundane story of a group of well-meaning but inept lunatics trying to build and fly an "aerobody"--a "wingless" airplane shaped vaguely like one of Andrews' claimed balloon designs. (They sort of succeed, but the Aereon company goes broke a few weeks later and eventually the craft is put in permanent storage.)
Obviously the airplane (airplane? airplane!) had a wing, it just didn't look like one. Someday I will build the "crumpled-paper airplane" where I hang a motor underneath a giant piece of crumpled paper... perhaps I can call it a "crumpulator".
McPhee's writing is a little strange, and many words are used in slightly odd ways. It's not horrible, but not good. (I'm not anxious to read any of his other books, let's put it that way.)
The story itself is predictable, if you're familiar with the history of mad scientists with mediocre ideas. The design is kept in secret; the first N all-in attempts catastrophically fail on their first try; inadequate testing; absurd visionary dreams; insufficient funding; infighting; religious mania; suppression by "the man". It was interesting to read, but only in the same way watching a dot-com fail in slow motion is interesting.
I'm very interested in learning about Andrews and whether his designs ever actually existed (and worked), but this isn't the place to find out.
Another great McPhee work.......2002-02-08
I am an unabashed fan of John McPhee, and believe him to be one of the todays's best non-fiction writers. _The Deltoid Pumpkin Seed_ does nothing but reinforce my impression.
I knew very little about 'lighter-than-air' history or technology before reading _Pumpkin Seed_, but McPhee assumes no prior knowledge. Indeed, one of the things I like best about McPhee is his ability to explain topics of a complex nature to a lay audience.
The story's 'characters' are exquisitely developed, and their interactions with each other are sometimes tragic, often hillarious. A number of them would make fascinating subjects for biographies in their own right.
If you have any interest in avaiation history, or just enjoy reading a well-crafted non-fiction work, I highly recommend this book.
Wingless Wonder.......2001-08-05
McPhee tells the tale of the Aereon, a wingless airplane. It's a story about a dream, really, and a bunch of dreamers aching to bring back the big-airship ideal. There's Monroe the missionary, Miller the fellow religious man, Fitzpatrick the designer who ends up pumping gas for a living, Kukon the master model builder, Olcott the cool test pilot. It's an amazing blend of history and character and scenes. It's also maybe the best pure writing I've seen by McPhee. In particular, the scene introducing Fitzpatrick is brilliant. The book's wind-down, centering on the last test flight of the Aereon 26, is worthy of study for the art of building suspense.
the worst, most pointless work in the history of the world.......1999-09-28
The total lack of interest generated by this book is inexcusable for such a "celebrated" author. This virtual wading pool of long, boring language was worthless and not worth the money i paid for it.
For a sense of wonder and anticipation that stays with you.......1999-04-24
This is the first McPhee book I ever read-- way back when it first came out. How well I remember it! How many years I have continued to look for news of the needed technology for large scale commercial use of lighter than air craft finally being mastered (and we still seem on the brink of making it work). A bookstore clerk had told me as I picked up the book, "That is one strange book. We do not know where to put it. Should it be in history, science, biography, reference, the technology section on air craft, business? No place seems quite right." I knew I would read more books by McPhee after this exquisite find, but I did not expect the next one to be on-- oranges! What a book The Deltoid Pumpkin Seed is; what a writer McPhee is. His books always leave you with the feeling that you now have a special insight into something out of the ordinary. And indeed you do.
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