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Texas Takes Wing: A Century of Flight in the Lone Star State
Tracing the hundred-year history of aviation in Texas, aviator and historian Barbara Ganson brings to life the colorful personalities that shaped the phenomenally successful development of this industry in the state. Weaving stories and profiles of aviators, designers, manufacturers, and those in related services, Texas Takes Wing covers the major trends that propelled Texas to the forefront of the field. Covering institutions from San Antonio’s Randolph Air Force Base (the West Point of this branch of service) to Brownsville’s airport with its Pan American Airlines instrument flight school (which served as an international gateway to Latin America as early as the 1920s) to Houston’s Johnson Space Center, home of Mission Control for the U.S. space program, the book provides an exhilarating timeline and engaging history of dozens of unsung pioneers as well as their more widely celebrated peers. Drawn from personal interviews as well as major archives and the collections of several commercial airlines, including American, Southwest, Braniff, Pan American Airways, and Continental, this sweeping history captures the story of powered flight in Texas since 1910. With its generally favorable flying weather, flat terrain, and wide open spaces, Texas has more airports than any other state and is often considered one of America’s most aviation-friendly places. Texas Takes Wing also explores the men and women who made the region pivotal in military training, aircraft manufacturing during wartime, general aviation, and air servicing of the agricultural industry. The result is a soaring history that will delight aviators and passengers alike.
312 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 2014
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September 16, 2019by Sara Hillin
Barbara Ganson's Texas Takes Wing: A Century of Flight in the Lone Star State is a fascinating read and a welcome addition to other recent texts that are adding to our body of knowledge on the history of aviation. The work is thorough and clearly the effort of years of research that has taken the author from resources such as the Woman's Collection at Texas Woman's University to special collections like the “History of Aviation Collection” at the University of Texas at Dallas. Along with snapshots of the careers of more well known Texas pilots such as the infamous Howard Hughes and the resourceful and brave African American pilot Bessie Coleman, who enlisted editor Robert Abbot's help in financing her flight instruction in France, Ganson also introduces us to lesser known figures such as Bonnie Caputo, the first woman to fly for American Airlines, and Ormer Locklear, who “initiated a nationwide craze for wing walking and daredevilry” (45).
The plethora of women's achievements noted in this volume is also a positive game changer for discourse on aviation history. Not only does Ganson offer a discussion of the WASPs (Women Airforce Service Pilots), which many readers will have some familiarity with, but she also goes back in time to recover the contributions of some of the much earlier women aviators such as Edna Gardner Whyte and Frances Harrell Marsalis, both air racers of the 1930s.
Ganson's text is written in a series of engaging and well researched vignettes that blends general aviation history with the specifics of various pilots' pioneering contributions to the field. The timeline takes readers from 1910, when L.F. “Creary” Smith and Leslie L. “Shorty” Walker, created and flew the first Texas-based aircraft, to 2012, the year in which the first flight of the Boeing 787 Dreamliner took place at George Bush Intercontinental airport.
The two appendices offer a general timeline of aviation events as well as a list of Tuskegee Airmen from the Lone Star State who, between 1942 and 1946, earned their military wings. The many images included of both pilots and their aircraft offer readers an engaging supplement to a century's worth of events packed into the text. Texas Takes Wing should be of great interest to history buffs and aviation enthusiasts alike, not to mention those who seek a more thorough discussion of women's prominent achievements in this area.
https://us14.campaign-archive.com/?u=...
Barbara Ganson's Texas Takes Wing: A Century of Flight in the Lone Star State is a fascinating read and a welcome addition to other recent texts that are adding to our body of knowledge on the history of aviation. The work is thorough and clearly the effort of years of research that has taken the author from resources such as the Woman's Collection at Texas Woman's University to special collections like the “History of Aviation Collection” at the University of Texas at Dallas. Along with snapshots of the careers of more well known Texas pilots such as the infamous Howard Hughes and the resourceful and brave African American pilot Bessie Coleman, who enlisted editor Robert Abbot's help in financing her flight instruction in France, Ganson also introduces us to lesser known figures such as Bonnie Caputo, the first woman to fly for American Airlines, and Ormer Locklear, who “initiated a nationwide craze for wing walking and daredevilry” (45).
The plethora of women's achievements noted in this volume is also a positive game changer for discourse on aviation history. Not only does Ganson offer a discussion of the WASPs (Women Airforce Service Pilots), which many readers will have some familiarity with, but she also goes back in time to recover the contributions of some of the much earlier women aviators such as Edna Gardner Whyte and Frances Harrell Marsalis, both air racers of the 1930s.
Ganson's text is written in a series of engaging and well researched vignettes that blends general aviation history with the specifics of various pilots' pioneering contributions to the field. The timeline takes readers from 1910, when L.F. “Creary” Smith and Leslie L. “Shorty” Walker, created and flew the first Texas-based aircraft, to 2012, the year in which the first flight of the Boeing 787 Dreamliner took place at George Bush Intercontinental airport.
The two appendices offer a general timeline of aviation events as well as a list of Tuskegee Airmen from the Lone Star State who, between 1942 and 1946, earned their military wings. The many images included of both pilots and their aircraft offer readers an engaging supplement to a century's worth of events packed into the text. Texas Takes Wing should be of great interest to history buffs and aviation enthusiasts alike, not to mention those who seek a more thorough discussion of women's prominent achievements in this area.
https://us14.campaign-archive.com/?u=...
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