Take a juicy foray into the all-but-forgotten history of Chilton County, Alabama.

Located in the geographic center of the state, Chilton County is the Peach Capital of Alabama. The mild climate and gently sloping terrain of central Alabama provide an ideal environment for cultivation of the region's principal agricultural export and Alabama's leading commercial fruit. This distinctive setting has influenced the heritage and historical legacy of the county and its people for more than 100 years. From the big peach water tower that welcomes visitors to Chilton County to t...

Local businessman and inventor John Ellis Fowler introduced the concept of the flying machine to Mobile and South Alabama. Fowler�s innovative designs mark the beginning of the remarkable aviation heritage of Alabama�s port city, a legacy further enhanced by the evolution of military and civilian aviation on Alabama�s Gulf Coast. A mild climate and abundance of flat terrain made the region attractive for the establishment of military flight training programs during the World War II while t...

They were the biggest Ranger company in Vietnam, and the best. For eighteen months, John L. Rotundo and Don Ericson braved the test of war at its most bloody and most raw, specializing in ambushing the enemy and fighting jungle guerillas using their own tactics. From the undiluted high of a "contact" with the enemy to the anguished mourning of a fallen comrade, they experienced nearly every emotion known to man--most of all, the power and the pride of being the finest on America's front li...

This book is a collection of fascinating short stories, photos, and documents furnished by the heroic and courageous men that served as air or ground crew members in Vietnam. The chopper units were located throughout Vietnam. During the course of the war, we lost at least 5,139 helicopter air crew members and at least 588 ground support crew members. In fact, the true number of helicopter air and ground crew members killed or missing in action will probably never be known. Those crew membe...

Perhaps the most accurate story of LRRPs at warever to appear in print!When Frank Johnson arrived in Vietnam in 1969, he was nineteen, a young soldier untested in combat like thousands of others--but with two important differences: Johnson volunteered for the elite L Company Rangers of the 101st Airborne Division, a long range reconnaissance patrol (LRRP) unit, and he kept a secret diary, a practice forbidden by the military to protect the security of LRRP operations.

A fascinating and authoritative narrative history of the V-22 Osprey, revealing the inside story of the most controversial piece of military hardware ever developed for the United States Marine Corps.When the Marines decided to buy a helicopter-airplane hybrid “tiltrotor” called the V-22 Osprey, they saw it as their dream machine. The tiltrotor was the aviation equivalent of finding the Northwest Passage: an aircraft able to take off, land, and hover with the agili...

Official navy historian John Sherwood offers an authoritative social history of the air war, focused around fourteen of these aviators—from legends like Robin Olds, Steve Ritchie, and John Nichols to lesser-known but equally heroic fighters like Roger Lerseth and Ted Sienecki.The war in the skies above Vietnam still stands as the longest our nation has ever fought. For fourteen years American pilots dropped bombs on the Southeast Asian countryside—eventually more t...

We could call this book “Special Operations Recon Mission Impossible.” A small group of highly trained, resourceful US Special Forces (SF) men is asked to go in teams behind the enemy lines to gather intelligence on the North Vietnamese Army units that had infiltrated through Laos and Cambodia down the Ho Chi Minh trails to their secret bases inside the Cambodian border west of South Vietnam. The covert reconnaissance teams, of only two or three SF men with four or five experienced indigen...

If you're looking for a great eBook on the history of flight, read this guide to aircraft, the history of the airplane, aviation history, history of flightgear, history of flight poster and more.

Seven War Stories presents the autobiography of a retired air force veteran who served in the Korean War, the conflict in Southeast Asia, and the Cuban crisis. Donald J. Meeks boyhood dream was to be a pilot in the air forcea goal that was unattainable when he enlisted, as high school graduates were not being accepted into pilot training. He was determined to fly, however, and became a crewmember in numerous types of aircraft; trying many different jobs until he achieved his ultim...

To Be A U.S. Air Force Pilot details every step of training for those with the skill and daring to "cross into the blue" as an elite U.S. Air Force pilot. The book traces the growth of aspiring young recruits, starting with grueling physical and mental tests, early flight training on high-tech flight simulators, moving onward and upward until they are finally ready to push the outer envelope to Mach II in state-of-the-art fighter aircraft. Thanks to the highly motivated, highly s...