Description
Renowned for its in-depth articles from 250 specialist authors worldwide, The Aviation Historian is a quarterly journal that is valued and respected for its superb high-quality archive photography and specially-commissioned drawings, profiles and information graphics. Conceived and produced by a four-person team who between them have clocked up 84 years’ experience on aviation-history magazines, the journal combines traditional attention-to-detail with a modern tone.
Covering military and civil aviation from before the Wright Brothers to the dawn of spaceflight, this compact-format square-spined quarterly journal is designed to take its place alongside the most treasured books on your shelves. Making new discoveries in your favorite field of interest is always exciting, whether you’re a history aficionado, a modeler on the hunt for new projects, or both.
The Aviation Historian provides great reading and first-class reference material to feed your passion. It truly is “aviation history for connoisseurs."
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Table of Contents
EDITOR’S LETTER
AIR CORRESPONDENCE
ON HEAVEN’S DOORSTEP
Worcestershire-based author Tony Buttler investigates local reports of Cyril Uwins’s record-setting flight to 44,000ft over Evesham in a Vickers Vespa in September 1932
HOW NOT TO CHOOSE A FIGHTER
Gregory Alegi provides fresh insight into Italy’s disastrous wartime procurement of a series of promising fighters powered by Germany’s state-of-the-art DB 605 engine
ECHOES FROM DAWN SKIES: BIRDS OF A FEATHER
Our serialisation of British pioneer F.W. Merriam’s long-lost manuscript of memories from his contemporaries continues with recollections by Ronald Kemp, and of F.P. Raynham
SELL IT TO THE MARINES
Chris Farara opens our two-part section on the AV-8A Harrier with the story of the type’s development up to its introduction into US Marine Corps service . . .
BIRD OF PREY
. . . at which point Lon Nordeen takes over to detail the invaluable jump-jet’s career with the “Flying Leathernecks”
THE POLKA DOT RIDGE-RUNNERS
The RF-51D Mustang pilots of the USAF’s 45th TRS arguably flew the most dangerous low-level missions of the entire Korean conflict, as Doug Gordon relates
“THERE WERE FINS, WINGS AND COUNTLESS OTHER THINGS . . .”
Philip Jarrett presents a selection of magnificent original photographs collected by mechanic George Wright in Egypt during World War One
AN EYE FOR DETAIL: GET CRUNGE!
Next up in Juanita Franzi’s series on lesser-known airframes and their markings is an RAAF Mirage III that, albeit temporarily, became the mount of “AVM Hannibal Crunge”
FOLLAND’S FORGOTTEN MONOPLANES Pt 2
The second of Ralph Pegram’s three articles on the little-known Gloster monoplane designs of Henry Folland
“SOME SUPREME EFFORT . . .”
In June 1942 an Allied airlift of global proportions was mounted to resupply British forces in North Africa in the wake of the fall of Tobruk. Ray Flude tells the full epic story
THE SHAH’S SKYHOOKS
Further to our history of the Cessna CH-1 Skyhook in TAH3, Iranian aviation historian Babak Taghvaee tracked down Iran’s first helicopter pilot, Col Gholam-Reza Rahbariyan, to find out more about the type in Iranian Gendarmerie service
AGAINST ALL ODDS
David H. Stringer concludes his definitive two-part history of the USA’s post-war non-scheduled airlines — or “nonskeds” — from the Korean conflict to deregulation
ARMCHAIR AVIATION
LOST & FOUND
ALIAS THUNDERBIRD 6
Pilot, airshow commentator and part-time air-traffic controller Melvyn Hiscock reveals the alter ego of Tiger Moth G-ANFM, and explains how Joan Hughes landed herself in trouble with the aircraft in 1967 — by failing to land
OFF THE BEATEN TRACK