The Memphis Belle B-17 survived 25 combat missions over Europe, then 40 years of outdoor neglect, before a 12-year restoration returned her to museum condition in 2018.
TaildraggerThe Republic P-47 Thunderbolt outscored every Allied fighter group in the European theater - here's why the heaviest single-engine fighter of WWII remains underappreciated.
TaildraggerHarold Gillam was Alaska's most technically disciplined bush pilot - and his final flight in January 1943 became one of the territory's most haunting stories.
TaildraggerHow Doc's Friends spent 16 years and 300,000 volunteer hours rescuing a B-29 Superfortress from the Mojave Desert and returning it to Wichita's skies.
TaildraggerThe Curtiss NC-4 crossed the North Atlantic in May 1919 - eight years before Lindbergh - carrying six Navy men 1,500 miles by dead reckoning alone.
TaildraggerThe Soviet 588th Night Bomber Regiment - the Night Witches - flew 23,000 WWII combat sorties in fabric biplanes, navigating at night by compass and clock alone.
TaildraggerOn December 14, 1986, Dick Rutan and Jeana Yeager completed the first nonstop, unrefueled flight around the world in the Rutan Voyager, covering 25,000 miles in nine days.
TaildraggerThe F4U Corsair went from Navy reject to one of WWII's most feared fighters - built around a massive engine, refined by Marines, and flying combat missions into 1969.
TaildraggerWiley Post used a $1,800 workers' comp settlement to learn to fly, then circled the globe twice, discovered the jet stream, and invented the pressure suit.
TaildraggerOn July 17, 1938, Douglas Corrigan flew from New York to Ireland on a flight plan filed for Los Angeles - and spent 57 years insisting it was a compass error.
TaildraggerOn July 2, 1937, Amelia Earhart and navigator Fred Noonan vanished over the Pacific during their final approach to Howland Island - a radio failure that aviation still learns from today.
TaildraggerOn July 2, 1900, Ferdinand von Zeppelin's LZ-1 made its first flight over Lake Constance - predating the Wright Brothers by three years and launching the world's first commercial airline.
TaildraggerThe Lockheed Constellation revolutionized transatlantic travel with its pressurized cabin, 300+ mph cruise speed, and unmistakable triple-tail silhouette - and a design story that's as compelling as the aircraft itself.
TaildraggerHow Wilfrid 'Wop' May survived being chased by the Red Baron in 1918 and went on to complete a life-saving mercy flight through the Canadian wilderness in 1929.
TaildraggerOn October 14, 1943, the Eighth Air Force launched 291 B-17s against Schweinfurt's ball bearing factories and lost 60 aircraft and 600 men in a single day.
TaildraggerOn July 21, 1921, Army Air Service bombers sank the German battleship Ostfriesland in 21 minutes, validating Billy Mitchell's controversial claim that airpower had made the battleship obsolete.
TaildraggerBefore crossing the Atlantic, Charles Lindbergh spent years as a barnstormer, building the real-world skills that made his historic 1927 flight possible.
TaildraggerThe 1956 Grand Canyon mid-air collision killed 128 people and directly triggered the creation of the Federal Aviation Administration - reshaping every clearance, squawk code, and radar handoff in use today.
TaildraggerOn May 24, 1988, TACA Flight 110's crew deadsticked a powerless Boeing 737 onto a Louisiana levee, saving all 45 people aboard.
TaildraggerThe Douglas DC-3 transformed commercial aviation in 1936 and went on to serve in WWII, the Berlin Airlift, and Vietnam - with hundreds still flying today.
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