Who is the pilot that broke the speed of sound in 1947 that was interviewed for the book by Tom Wolfe?
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The Right Stuff (book) The Right Stuff is a 1979 book by Tom Wolfe about the pilots engaged in U.S. postwar research with experimental rocket-powered, high-speed aircraft as well as documenting the stories of the first Project Mercury astronauts selected for the NASA space program. "The Right Stuff" is based on extensive research by Wolfe, who interviewed test pilots, the astronauts and their wives, among others. The story contrasts the "Mercury Seven" and their families with test pilots such as Chuck Yeager, who was considered by many contemporaries as the best of them all, but who was never selected as an astronaut.
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Chuck Yeager Charles Elwood "Chuck" Yeager ( ; born February 13 , 1923) is a former United States Air Force general officer and record-setting test pilot. In 1947, he became the first pilot confirmed to have exceeded the speed of sound in level flight.
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Last Flight (book) Last Flight is a book published in 1937 consisting of diary entries and other notes compiled by aviation pioneer Amelia Earhart during her failed attempt that year at flying solo across the Pacific Ocean. Her husband, publisher George Palmer Putnam, edited the collection which was published posthumously as a tribute to his wife.
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Babs (land speed record car) Babs was the land speed record car built and driven by John Parry-Thomas. It was powered by a 27-litre Liberty aero-engine.
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Spitfire 944 Spitfire 944 is a short documentary in which an 83-year-old World War II pilot views 16mm footage of his 1944 Spitfire crash-landing for the first time, sixty-one years after the event.
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Arthur Duray Arthur Duray (9 February 1882 – 11 February 1954) was born in New York City of Belgian parents and later became a French citizen. An early aviator, he held Belgian license #3. He is probably best known today for breaking the land speed record on three separate occasions between July, 1903 and March, 1904. Driver George Stewart legally changed his name to Leon Duray in tribute to fellow driver Arthur Duray.
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Tempo Alcoa The Tempo Alcoa was a jet-powered hydroplane designed by the Aluminum Company of America (ALCOA) and hydroplane driver and band leader Guy Lombardo for the sake of setting a new world speed record on water.
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Robert Lee Scott Jr. Robert Lee Scott Jr. (12 April 1908 – 27 February 2006) was a brigadier general in the United States Air Force. Scott is best known for his autobiography "God is My Co-Pilot" about his exploits in World War II with the Flying Tigers and the United States Army Air Forces in China and Burma. The book was eventually made into a film of the same name.
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BOAC Flight 911 BOAC Flight 911 (Speedbird 911) was a round-the-world flight operated by British Overseas Airways Corporation that crashed as a result of an encounter with severe clear-air turbulence near Mount Fuji in Japan on 5 March 1966. The Boeing 707-436 on this flight was commanded by Captain Bernard Dobson, 45, from Dorset, an experienced 707 pilot who had been flying these aircraft since November 1960.
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George Eyston Captain George Edward Thomas Eyston MC OBE (28 June 1897 – 11 June 1979) was a British racing driver in the 1920s and 1930s, and he broke the land speed record three times between 1937 and 1939. He was also an engineer and inventor.
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Dominic Salvatore Gentile Major Dominic Salvatore "Don" Gentile (December 6, 1920 – January 28, 1951) was a World War II USAAF pilot who surpassed Eddie Rickenbacker's World War I record of 26 downed aircraft. He later served in the post-war U.S. Air Force.
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Experimental Talking Clock The Experimental Talking Clock was recorded c. 1878 by inventor Frank Lambert. It was long thought to be the world's oldest playable sound recording and is listed in both the Guinness Book of World Records and The Encyclopedia of Recorded Sound as such; however, an older phonautogram recording from 1860 by Édouard-Léon Scott de Martinville was reproduced for the first time in 2008 with the aid of modern technology. The talking clock is still the oldest recording that can be played back with its own mechanism, without the involvement of digital technology.
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George E. A. Hallett Colonel George Eustace Amyot Hallett (May 9, 1890 – June 2, 1982) was a pioneer aviator. He and John Cyril Porte planned to make the first transatlantic flight. They were going to use a flying boat commissioned by Rodman Wanamaker, but were prevented by the start of World War I. In 1919 the transatlantic flight of Alcock and Brown set the record that they hoped to achieve.
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Wedell-Williams Model 44 The Wedell-Williams Model 44 is a racing aircraft, four examples of which were built in the United States in the early 1930s by the Wedell-Williams Air Service Corporation. It began as a rebuilding of the partnership's successful "We-Will" 1929 racer, but soon turned into a completely new racing monoplane aircraft, powered by a large radial engine. Model 44s became the dominant racers of the 1930s, setting innumerable records including setting a new world speed record in 1933.
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Listen! The Wind Listen! The Wind is a 1938 book by the American writer Anne Morrow Lindbergh. It tells the story of Lindbergh's and her husband Charles Lindbergh's 1933 flight from Africa to South America across the Atlantic Ocean. The book focuses on the last ten days of the flight, when weather conditions and illness caused trouble for the couple. The book has a foreword and map drawings by Charles Lindbergh.
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Bill Warner (motorcycle racer) William Walter "Bill" Warner (February 11, 1969 – July 14, 2013) was an American motorcycle racer who set the land speed record on a conventional motorcycle in 2011. He died while racing his motorcycle in 2013.
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Phonometer A phonometer is an instrument invented by Thomas Edison for testing the force of the human voice in speaking. It consists chiefly of a mouthpiece and diaphragm. Behind the diaphragm is placed a delicate mechanism which operates a 15-inch flywheel by means of which a hole can be bored in an ordinary pine board.
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Gerry Sayer Flying Officer Phillip Edward Gerald Sayer {'1': ", '2': ", '3': ", '4': "} (5 February 1905 – 21 October 1942), was the chief test pilot for Gloster Aircraft as well as a serving RAF officer. "Gerry" Sayer flew Britain's maiden jet flight in Sir Frank Whittle's Gloster E.28/39 (Pioneer), an aircraft designed by George Carter, on 15 May 1941.
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Ralph Johnstone Ralph Greenley Johnstone (September 18, 1880 – November 17, 1910) was the first American person to die while piloting an airplane that crashed. He and Archibald Hoxsey were known as the "heavenly twins" for their attempts to break altitude records.
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Kamikaze (aircraft) Kamikaze (神風号 , Kamikaze-gō ) was a Mitsubishi Ki-15 "Karigane" aircraft, (registration J-BAAI) sponsored by the newspaper " Asahi Shimbun". It became famous on April 9, 1937, as the first Japanese-built aircraft to fly from Japan to Europe. The flight from Tokyo to London took 51 hours, 17 minutes and 23 seconds and was piloted by Masaaki Iinuma (1912–1941), with Kenji Tsukagoshi (1900–1943) serving as navigator.
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Barney Oldfield Berna Eli "Barney" Oldfield (January 29, 1878 – October 4, 1946) was an American pioneer automobile racer "whose name was synonymous with speed in the first two decades of the 20th century". He began racing in 1902 and continued until his retirement in 1918. He was the first man to drive a car at 60 miles per hour (96 km/h).
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Robert Stanley (aviator) Robert M. Stanley (August 19, 1912 – July 16, 1977) was an American test pilot and engineer. He became the first American to fly a jet aircraft on October 2, 1942, as a civilian test pilot for Bell Aircraft. He flew the Bell XP-59A Airacomet, which was the United States’ first turbojet aircraft. The flight took place at Muroc Dry Lake, California. The Airacomet is on display at the National Air and Space Museum in Washington, D.C.