The Aviation Historian: Issue 3

EDITOR'S LETTER

AIR CORRESPONDENCE

THERE I WAS...
Richard Paver recalls being at the sharp end for a historic photo-sortie with Ray and Mark Hanna and a Folland Gnat

I BUILT "THE LAST OF THE MANY"
Herbert Morris’s charming record of his experiences of wartime aircraft production at Hawker’s Langley factory

THE GLIDER WITH THE BUILT-IN THERMALS
TAH takes a look at France’s ingenious — if somewhat antisocial — pulsejet-powered glider, the Emouchet Escopette

PROJECT TERMINATED
Erik Simonsen examines the political decision-making process behind one of the most controversial cancellations of the Cold War era — the Avro Canada CF-105 Arrow

PIONEERING THE FIGHTER
Using material that has remained unpublished for a century, Philip Jarrett opens a comprehensive two-part history of the forerunners of the Royal Aircraft Factory’s S.E.5 fighter

CODENAME HIGHBALL AND ME
The late William Hiscock was serving off Normandy when his ship was sent to Scotland for an unusual top secret mission

PUTTING MAIN STREET USA ON THE MAP
David H. Stringer surveys the USA’s post-war Local Airline Service, which transformed the nation’s transport system

THE ULTIMATE WAR PRIZE
Vladimir Kotelnikov explains how captured German technology sparked the Soviet Union’s jet development programme

AIR AMERICA IN LAOS: THE FINAL CHAPTER
The concluding half of Jonathan Pote’s in-depth account of the history of the “CIA’s secret airline”, Air America, in Laos

EL RELAMPAGO EN ARGENTINA
Ricardo M. Lezon charts the career of the sole Lockheed P-38
Lightning used for photo-survey work in 1960s Argentina

CESSNA'S WHIRLYBIRD
The Editor traces the history of the Skyhook, Cessna’s recordsetting but flawed attempt to enter the helicopter market

BEFORE & AFTER
Roger Tisdale and Arvo Vercamer compare the colours of a Nieuport 17 flown by both White Russian and Estonian forces

BROKEN ARROW
1965: a US Navy A-4E Skyhawk armed with a live nuclear weapon slips off the deck of the USS Ticonderoga 90 miles from Japan. Was it covered up? Jim Winchester investigates

ARMCHAIR AVIATION

LOST & FOUND

MERCURY RISING
In an exclusive extract from his superb new book Spacesuit, Brett Gooden describes the challenges of designing a suit for NASA’s Mercury 7 astronauts

OFF THE BEATEN TRACK