Rocket Boys: The Exhilarating Exploits of the Early Mach Busters from 1945 onwards

(Hardback)

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This is a tale of the generation of test pilots flying experimental aircraft powered by rocket motors during the period from 1945 to the mid-1970s. It is not a technical description of the aircraft they flew but the narrative of the men who built the machines and the pilots who took to the air to achieve unprecedented speeds and altitudes unequalled to the present. It is a human story, but one carved out of the evolving post-war world, coming to terms with a new tension between global superpowers and one in which technological progress was arguably the greatest it has been since 1945. The book integrates the story of post-war US industry, the competitive drive to survive between plane-makers made rich by war production, challenged by the changed times of demobilisation and peace. Into the mix come fighter pilots and company men eager to sustain their craft and take on new challenges, alongside an emerging generation of post-war graduates straight from engineering or flight school, eager to make their mark. With a focus on those who achieved extraordinary things like Major 'Chuck' Yeager, Scott Crossfield and Joe Walker, there is also inclusion of those outside of the US's endeavours including how Eric 'Winkle' Brown became the only non-German to fly the rocket-powered Me 163 and the test-flying of John Booth and Peter Lamb. Rocket Boys is a record of the glorious years when nothing seemed impossible and which produced a group that propelled aviation into the stratosphere with devil-may-care attitudes and personal fortitude, with death and disaster stalking the very best.

Author Bio

David Baker worked with NASA on the Gemini, Apollo and Shuttle programs between 1965 and 1990. He has written more than 100 books on space flight, aviation, and military technology and is the former editor of Jane's Space Directory and Jane's Aircraft Upgrades. In 1986, he was made a member of the International Academy of Astronautics by NASA manned flight boss George Mueller and is a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society and a member of the US Air Force Association. He received the 1998 Rolls-Royce Award for Aerospace Journalist of the Year and in 2005 he was a recipient of the Arthur C Clarke Award. In October 2017, he received the American Astronautical Society's Frederick I. Ordway III award "for a sustained excellence in space coverage, through books and articles, as well as engagement in the early US space program". David is currently the editor of Spaceflight, the monthly space news magazine of the British Interplanetary Society, of which he is also a Fellow, a lecturer, and consultant.