Wiley Post, the Winnie Mae, and the Nineteen Thirty-Three Solo Flight Around the World
In July 1933, one-eyed pilot Wiley Post flew the Winnie Mae solo around the world in 7 days, 18 hours, and 49 minutes - and changed aviation forever.
The Hangar
Aviation history and storytelling with Taildragger. Warbird restorations, legendary pilots, famous flights, and the stories that shaped aviation from the Wright Brothers to the Space Shuttle.
Alberto Santos-Dumont, Airship Number Six, and the October Nineteenth Flight That Turned Paris Into a City Holding Its Breath
On October 19, 1901, Alberto Santos-Dumont flew Airship Number Six around the Eiffel Tower - proving for the first time that a machine could fly to a chosen destination.
Carl Ben Eielson, the Nanuk Rescue Mission, and the Bering Sea That Swallowed Alaska's Greatest Bush Pilot
Carl Ben Eielson proved Alaska could be crossed by air, flew the first trans-Arctic flight in 1928, and died on a Bering Sea rescue mission in 1929 at age 32.
Eddie Rickenbacker, the Hat-in-the-Ring Squadron, and the Race Driver Who Became America's Ace of Aces
Eddie Rickenbacker became America's top WWI ace with 26 victories, earned the Medal of Honor in a solo attack on seven German aircraft, and survived 24 days adrift in the Pacific at age 52.
Harriet Quimby, the English Channel, and the Flight the Titanic Buried
Harriet Quimby became the first woman to cross the English Channel solo in April 1912 - a record-breaking flight history nearly forgot because of the Titanic.
Ormer Locklear, the First Wing Walker, and the Hollywood Night Dive That Killed Aviation's Greatest Daredevil
Ormer Locklear invented wing walking as a maintenance fix in 1918, became Hollywood's first aviation stuntman, and died on camera at 28 before the barnstorming era he created had peaked.
Roscoe Turner, the Laird-Turner Meteor, and the Lion Who Won Three Thompson Trophies
Roscoe Turner won three Thompson Trophy races between 1934 and 1939, making him the most decorated closed-course air racer in National Air Races history.
That's All, Brother, the Douglas C Forty-Seven Skytrain That Led the D-Day Airborne Invasion, and the Fifty-Year Search That Found a Missing Lead Ship in a Boneyard
The C-47 that led the entire D-Day airborne formation spent fifty years lost in civil registries before a CAF volunteer researcher tracked it down and flew it over Normandy again.
The de Havilland Mosquito, the Wooden Wonder the Air Ministry Rejected, and the Unarmed Bomber Fast Enough to Outrun the Focke-Wulf
The de Havilland Mosquito was a twin-engine wooden bomber that outran German fighters and became the most versatile warplane of World War II despite being rejected by the Air Ministry.
The Gimli Glider, Air Canada Flight One Forty-Three, and the Dead-Stick Arrival That Became the Most Remarkable Landing in Commercial Aviation History
On July 23, 1983, a unit conversion error left Air Canada Flight 143 without fuel at 41,000 feet - and a glider pilot in the left seat brought it home.
The Grumman F6F Hellcat, the Aircraft Built to Beat the Zero, and the Great Marianas Turkey Shoot
The Grumman F6F Hellcat was engineered specifically to defeat the feared Mitsubishi Zero and went on to claim 5,163 aerial victories in World War II.
The North American XB-Seventy Valkyrie, the Mach Three Cold War Bomber Preserved at Wright-Patterson, and the Fatal Publicity Photo That Took Its Sister Ship
The North American XB-70 Valkyrie - America's only Mach 3 nuclear bomber - never flew its intended mission, but its sole surviving airframe at Wright-Patterson remains one of aviation's most arresting artifacts.
The Republic P-47 Thunderbolt, Alexander Kartveli's Heavyweight Champion, and the Eight-Ton Jug That Outlasted Everything the Luftwaffe Threw at It
The P-47 Thunderbolt was WWII's most-produced American fighter - 15,686 built - and its air-cooled radial engine made it nearly impossible to shoot down.
Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, The Little Prince, and the P-38 That Vanished Over the Mediterranean
Antoine de Saint-Exupéry - pilot, author of The Little Prince - flew Saharan mail routes, survived a Libyan Desert crash, and vanished on a P-38 reconnaissance mission on July 31, 1944.
Bob Reeve, the Mud Flats at Valdez, and the Glacier Pilot Who Landed Where Every Other Bush Pilot Turned Around
How Bob Reeve arrived in Valdez in 1932 with $12 and invented glacier landing techniques that defined Alaska aviation for half a century.
Dick Bong, America's Ace of Aces, Forty Kills, and the Day He Died That Nobody Noticed
Major Richard Bong, America's all-time top ace with 40 aerial victories and the Medal of Honor, died in a P-80 jet test flight the same morning the atomic bomb fell on Hiroshima.
Edwin Musick, the Martin M-130 China Clipper, and the Pan American Survey Flights That Opened the Pacific
How Edwin Musick's meticulous 1935 survey flights across 8,200 miles of open ocean made transpacific commercial aviation possible - and what it actually took to pull it off.
The Flying Tigers, Claire Chennault's American Volunteer Group, and the P Forty Tomahawks That Went to War Before America Did
The Flying Tigers were American pilots who flew combat for China against Japan before the U.S. entered WWII, achieving extraordinary kill ratios through Chennault's unorthodox dive-and-run tactics.
The Memphis Belle, the B-17F That Sat in the Tennessee Rain for Fifty Years, and the Restoration That Finally Brought Her Home
The Memphis Belle B-17F survived 25 combat missions over Europe in 1943, then spent 50 years deteriorating outdoors before a landmark restoration brought her inside permanently at the NMUSAF.
The Nineteen Twenty-Four World Flight, the Douglas World Cruisers, and the Eight Men Who Proved an Airplane Could Circle the Globe
In 1924, eight U.S. Army Air Service aviators became the first to fly around the world, covering 27,553 miles in 175 days aboard four Douglas World Cruisers.