Pilots: The Romance of The Air: Pilots Speak About the Triumphs and Tragedies, Fears and Joys of Flying

by William Neely

Here, Jimmy Doolittle, Chuck Yeager, and numerous other famous and not-so-famous pilots reflect on their flying experiences. Their commentaries reveal the mystique surrounding World War II fighters and bombers, light planes and crop dusters, modern jetliners, helicopters, and jet fighters, and the space shuttle. The instances, predicaments, remembrances, fears, loves, and other thoughts on these flying machines in all types of conditions lend meaning to the romance and emotion of flight. This is very light, entertaining reading for people interested in flying.

Genres: Aviation

237 pages, Hardcover

First published August 1, 1991

About the author

William Neely, a prolific racing writer who chronicled the lives of Richard Petty and A.J. Foyt, and was most famous for the 1974 classic Stand on It, a Novel by Stroker Ace, which told the fictional story of driver/wild man Stroker Ace and was later made into a movie starring Burt Reynolds and Loni Anderson. Neely loosely based the book on his experiences in the 1960s, when he headed up public relations for Goodyear at the height of the racing “tire wars” with Firestone.

During this time, Neely got to know many of the icons of the sport, as open-wheel racing was evolving and NASCAR first gained prominence in America. Through Goodyear, Neely also became close friends with another icon of racing in that era, Carroll Shelby, and the two maintained a nearly 50-year friendship.

Neely was AutoWeek’s travel editor in the late 1980s and early 1990s. His work also appeared in Playboy, Car and Driver, Esquire and Sports Illustrated. He also penned a chili cookbook, as well as Tire Wars, a look at Goodyear’s racing program in the 1960s. Neely’s relationships and story-telling ability won him the respect of his peers in journalism, a business notorious for competition. Neely also worked in public relations for Rolex and Exxon. In total, he authored 19 books.

Neely later turned to acting and appeared in "Night Flier" in 1997, a movie based on a Stephen King novel where Neely’s character had his head chopped off. He moved to Wilmington, North Carolina, about a decade ago to try to secure more acting roles with a local studio. He also made an unsuccessful bid for Congress.

In his later years, he enjoyed driving around Wilmington in a black 2002 Corvette, and lounging in a yacht he owned that previously belonged to Hollywood actress Greta Garbo. As his longtime friend Jeannette McLean said, he was “living the life of a retired person who loved life.”

-source: autoweek.com

Reviews

[Tyler · Rating 4 out of 5]

William Neely, an author of several books on auto racing, wrote this engaging book about the experiences of pilots from the World War I era through the book's publication in 1991 (I bought it at the Wings Over the Rockies Air and Space Museum in Denver, Colorado). He examines people who have taken to the skies in all sorts of aircraft, from military, to commercial, to recreational, to blimps, to Space Shuttles, and finds common threads among those who control flying machines that he details in his epilogue. He finds that pilots are "highly confident, individualistic, aggressive, and fun-loving." Pilots recognize danger, he believes, and are not immune to fear, but they have the confidence to overcome those feelings. I enjoyed reading Neely's stories about pilots who overcame challenging or even tragic situations (such as the way the United Airlines Flight 232 crew handled a loss of hydraulic power in July 1989 and saved lives by guiding the vehicle to Sioux City, Iowa). I do wonder how the tragic events of 9/11 and the security measures taken afterwards would have affected his book had he written it at a later date.

[Bill Coleman · Rating 3 out of 5]

A very digestible collection of stories about pilots. Covers a lot of ground from earliest flying, WW II, commercial airliner stories, racing, etc. A very easy read. If you love airplanes, you'll probably like this book.

[Tyler See · Rating 2 out of 5]

Poorly made. Hard to read.