Flak Bait: The Martin B-26 Marauder That Flew Two Hundred and Seven Missions
Flak Bait, the B-26 Marauder that flew 207 combat missions over Europe, is being fully restored at the Smithsonian with all 1,100+ battle damage patches preserved.
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.
Operation Chastise and the Sixty-Foot Run: The Night Barnes Wallis Sent the Dambusters to Breach the Ruhr
On the night of May 16, 1943, RAF 617 Squadron flew modified Lancasters at sixty feet above German reservoirs to deliver Barnes Wallis's revolutionary bouncing bomb against the Ruhr Valley dams.
Ormer Locklear and the Airplane Transfer: The Texan Who Built Barnstorming Into an Art Form
Ormer Locklear of Greenville, Texas invented airplane-to-airplane transfers and became barnstorming's first true showman before dying at 28 in 1920.
The China Clipper: Pan American's First Crossing of the Pacific
On November 22, 1935, Pan Am's China Clipper completed the first scheduled transpacific flight, covering 8,000 miles from California to Manila in 59 hours and 48 minutes of flying time.
The Dole Derby: The Race to Hawaii That Swallowed the Pacific
The 1927 Dole Derby offered $35,000 in prize money for a nonstop flight from Oakland to Honolulu, but the race became one of aviation's most sobering disasters.
The Dornier Do 335 Pfeil: The Fastest Piston Fighter Nobody Got to Fight
The Dornier Do 335 Pfeil was the fastest piston-engined fighter of WWII, reaching ~475 mph - but only around 40 were ever built.
The Grumman F6F Hellcat: The Fighter Engineered to End Zero Supremacy
The Grumman F6F Hellcat reversed American fortunes in the Pacific by out-engineering the Zero, achieving a 19-to-1 kill ratio and accounting for over 60% of all naval air victories.
The North American P-51 Mustang: The Fighter That Saved the Eighth Air Force
How the P-51 Mustang's Merlin engine and 1,100-mile range broke the Luftwaffe and rescued Allied strategic bombing from catastrophic failure in 1944.
The SR-71 Blackbird's New York to London Record: One Hour and Fifty-Four Minutes at Mach Three
On September 1, 1974, the SR-71 Blackbird crossed the Atlantic in 1 hour 54 minutes - a record no aircraft has broken in over 50 years.
Alcock and Brown: The Sixteen Hours That Crossed the Atlantic First
John Alcock and Arthur Whitten Brown completed the first nonstop transatlantic flight on June 14–15, 1919 - eight years before Lindbergh - in an open-cockpit WWI bomber.
Operation Vengeance: The P-38 Lightnings That Killed the Architect of Pearl Harbor
On April 18, 1943, sixteen P-38 Lightnings flew 435 miles over open ocean to intercept and kill Admiral Yamamoto, the architect of Pearl Harbor, using decoded Japanese communications.
Tex Johnston and the Barrel Roll That Sold the Jet Age
On August 7, 1955, Boeing test pilot Tex Johnston rolled a prototype jet airliner twice over Lake Washington, executing one of the most consequential demonstrations in aviation history.
The Gee Bee Racer: The Granville Brothers and the Most Dangerous Airplane of the Nineteen Thirties
The Gee Bee Super Sportster was the fastest piston racer of the 1930s - a machine so demanding it required genius to fly and cost its creators everything to build.
The Hughes H Four Hercules at the Evergreen Aviation Museum: The Largest Wingspan That Ever Left the Water
The Hughes H-4 Hercules holds the record for the largest wingspan of any aircraft ever flown at 320 feet, and has called Oregon's Evergreen Aviation Museum home since 2001.
The Memphis Belle Restoration: Four Decades of Rain and the Team That Brought Her Home
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.
The Republic P-47 Thunderbolt: The Jug That Flew Too Fast for Its Own Controls
The 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.
bush flying story
Harold 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.
Doc's Homecoming: The B-29 Superfortress Rescued From the California Desert
How 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.
The Curtiss NC-4: The Flying Boat That Crossed the Atlantic Before Lindbergh
The 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.
The Night Witches and the Five Eighty-Eighth Night Bomber Regiment
The 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.