Book Summary
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An Airline at War: The Story of Pan Am’s China National Aviation Corporation and Its Men, by Robert L. Willett, tells the compelling and little known story of the American and Chinese airmen who, for two decades, flew life and death missions over China during world wars, civil wars, and rare moments of peace.
An Airline at War: The Story of Pan Am’s China National Aviation Corporation and Its Men captures the high-drama of these pioneer men and women who established a dual-cultural partnership between steadfast allies. In its twenty tumultuous years the CNAC took the lives of 150 crewmembers, some American, but mostly Chinese. All except two of these years were in wartime, when China was fighting not only the Japanese, but also the Communists.
Told with heart and grit, Willett’s An Airline at War: The Story of Pan Am’s China National Aviation Corporation and Its Men will deepen anyone’s appreciation for the sacrifice, courage, and bold adventurism of the extraordinary men and women of an airline at war. +
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From the acclaimed author of ''Enduring Patagonia'' comes a dazzling tale of aerial adventure set against the roiling backdrop of war in Asia. The incredible real-life saga of the flying band of brothers who opened the skies over China in the years leading up to World War II—and boldly safeguarded them during that conflict—China’s Wings is one of the most exhilarating untold chapters in the annals of flight.
At the center of the maelstrom is the book’s courtly, laconic protagonist, American aviation executive William Langhorne Bond. In search of adventure, he arrives in Nationalist China in 1931, charged with turning around the turbulent nation’s flagging airline business, the China National Aviation Corporation (CNAC). The mission will take him to the wild and lawless frontiers of commercial aviation: into cockpits with daredevil pilots flying—sometimes literally—on a wing and a prayer; into the dangerous maze of Chinese politics, where scheming warlords and volatile military officers jockey for advantage; and into the boardrooms, backrooms, and corridors of power inhabited by such outsized figures as Generalissimo and Madame Chiang Kai-shek; President Franklin Delano Roosevelt; foreign minister T. V. Soong; Generals Arnold, Stilwell, and Marshall; and legendary Pan American Airways founder Juan Trippe.
With the outbreak of full-scale war in 1941, Bond and CNAC are transformed from uneasy spectators to active participants in the struggle against Axis imperialism. Drawing on meticulous research, primary sources, and extensive personal interviews with participants, Gregory Crouch offers harrowing accounts of brutal bombing runs and heroic evacuations, as the fight to keep one airline flying becomes part of the larger struggle for China’s survival. He plunges us into a world of perilous night flights, emergency water landings, and the constant threat of predatory Japanese warplanes. When Japanese forces capture Burma and blockade China’s only overland supply route, Bond and his pilots must battle shortages of airplanes, personnel, and spare parts to airlift supplies over an untried five-hundred-mile-long aerial gauntlet high above the Himalayas—the infamous “Hump”—pioneering one of the most celebrated endeavors in aviation history.
A hero’s-eye view of history in the grand tradition of Lynne Olson’s Citizens of London, China’s Wings takes readers on a mesmerizing journey to a time and place that reshaped the modern world.
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OUT OR WAR-TORN SKIES, A LEGENDARY PILOT IS BORN Royal Leonard (1905-1962) flew in and out of aviation history - just on the edge of fame. His exploits mirror important developments in the Golden Age of American Aviation (1925-1941) and the Sino-Japanese War (1937-1945). "If Royal's story were told in a novel," says long-time China pilot and author Felix Smith, "nobody would believe it all could have happened to one man."
Royal learned his craft at the West Point of the Air in San Antonio, Texas. As a Western Air Express night mail pilot, he pioneered blind flying along the treacherous Rocky Mountains. As a TWA pilot, he introduced celestial navigation. An early Airline Pilots Association (ALPA) officer, he fought for mail plane safety at the cost of his job. He flew the Lockheed Orion in which Wiley Post and Will Rogers later crashed and attributed their fatal accident to a surprising cause. During the 1930s, a handful of elite pilots were racers. Jackie Cochran selected Royal as a copilot for the MacRobertson Race of the Century between England and Australia. Royal also competed in the Bendix Death Race in a Gee Bee Widow Maker.
Before World War II, Royal worked for the Chinese warlord known as the Young Marshal who kidnapped Nationalist dictator Chiang Kai-shek and changed the course of Chinese history. Royal provided Communist political commissar Chou En-lai his first plane ride and later served as Chiang Kai-shek's personal pilot. During the war, Royal's roles were unique. Claire Chennault chose him to command the Flying Tigers Bomber Group. Royal briefed Colonel Jimmy Doolittle on Chinese landing fields for the Tokyo Raid. Royal, Chennault and Madame Chiang Kai-shek planned their own Tokyo bombing raid. Royal survived flying the Skyway to Hell over the Hump for China National Aviation Corporation. No wonder after a perilous flight war correspondent Martha Gellhorn described Royal as her "hero."
'''Author's Biography:''' The author has spent twenty years uncovering a rich trove of private documentary sources about the Forgotten Aviator. Martin is a Phi Beta Kappa graduate of the College of William and Mary and has an M.A. in history from the University of Washington and a J.D. from the University of California - Berkeley. He is a retired Administrative Law Judge and resides in Sacramento, California with his wife, Carolyn.
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<h4>A Lifetime of Aviation: From Balloons Through the Pan American Airway Years</h4>
Explore the history of aviation through the eyes of Harold Bixby (1890-1965), including ballooning, the 1923 International Air Races in St. Louis, early air mail, Bixby’s relationship with Charles Lindbergh and Lindbergh’s famous solo flight across the Atlantic in 1927, Bixby’s pioneering years in China in the 1930’s establishing the first air mail and passenger routes with the China National Aviation Corp., a subsidiary of Pan American Airways, and the preparations for the first trans-Pacific flight in the China Clipper in 1935.
Bixby was active in aviation as a technical advisor well after his retirement as PAA vice-president in 1955. In his later years, conservation efforts in Florida absorbed him including working with J.N. “Ding” Darling in establishing the Wildlife Refuge on Sanibel Island and in efforts to control erosion on Captiva Island, his winter home.
“I am thoroughly captivated by Benjamin Barrett’s book about the life and work of his grandfather, Harold Bixby, one of the most important figures in the development of aviation around the world. [Bixby’s] love of flying encompassed the world, yet he was a self-effacing, modest man who took little credit for his own contributions.
Bixby was at the heart of the group [...] who raised the funds to build the “Spirit of St. Louis” for my father’s flight from New York to Paris in 1927, and the two men became close friends for a lifetime. It has been a joy to me to see their letters here, at first between “Mr. Bixby” and “Mr. Lindbergh” at the outset of the great “Spirit of St. Louis” adventure, but continuing as thoughtful, deeply informative and frequently humorous exchanges between “Bix” and “Slim” over the decades.
The book has been meticulously researched and beautifully presented, with careful arrangements, of photographs, maps, letters and records for the reader to pore over. This is, first of all, a labor of love and hard work on the part of Ben Barrett in honor of his grandfather, bit it is also a real gift to the history of aviation, and to those of us who remember the aviation pioneers. <i>Reeve Lindbergh</i>
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Pan Am at War chronicles the airline's historic role in advancing aviation and serving America's national interest before and during World War II. From its inception, Pan American Airways operated as the "wings of democracy," spanning six continents and placing the country at the leading edge of international aviation.
At the same time, it was clandestinely helping to fight America's wars.
Utilizing government documents, declassified Freedom of Information Act material, and company documents, the authors have uncovered stories of Pan Am's stunning role as an instrument of American might:
*The airline's role in building air bases in Latin America and countering Axis interests that threatened the Panama Canal
*Creating transatlantic and trans-Africa supply lines for sending Lend-Lease equipment to Britain
*Cooperation with Chiang Kai-shek and the Chinese nationalist government to pioneer the dangerous "Hump" route over the Himalayas
*The dangerous seventeen-thousand-mile journey that took President Roosevelt to the high-stakes Casablanca Conference with Winston Churchill
*The daring flight that delivered uranium for the atomic bomb.
For anyone interested in aviation, business, or military history, here is astonishing story filled with big ideas and the leaders who made them a reality. +
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William M. Leary Jr.’s study combines history with personal drama to reconstruct an important chapter in the early years of aviation. He has conducted intensive research in American governmental archives, the Hoover Institution, and numerous libraries throughout the United States, in addition to obtaining access to the records of Pan American Airways (who bought out CNAC in 1933). His history of CNAC offers insights into the history of modern China and sheds light on several key aspects of Sino-American diplomatic and business relations. +
Born to Fly
China’s wide-open skies were perfect… if you didn’t mind typhoons, sand storms, blizzards, uncharted mountains and Japanese Zeros hunting you.
Billy McDonald of Birmingham, Alabama, had an adventurous and dangerous career as a pilot in the Golden Age of Flight, and into World War II.
He jumped from military cadet to wingman in Chennault’s famed aerobatic flying group Three Men on a Flying Trapeze. In China, he moved from instructor for the Chinese Air Force to combat pilot flying Chennault’s legendary Hawk 75 Special against the Japanese over Nanking in 1937. He began by ferrying world-famous passengers like Hemingway and high-value cargo like gold for the China National Aviation Corporation and then flew gasoline and gunpowder over The Hump (Himalayas) for Chennault’s Flying Tigers and the Chinese Army.
Through it all, controversial and legendary aviator Claire Lee Chennault remained his mentor, often his boss and always his friend, indelibly shaping his life.
This is the story of a remarkable career, and a man who bore witness to some of the twentieth century’s historic events and pivotal characters. Mac tells us the tale in his own words through newly-discovered photos, correspondence and manuscripts. +
In 1938, Harold M. Bixby, wrote a book entitled Top Side Ricksha. Originally, Harold Bixby privately published about 20 copies of Top Side Ricksha. The book contains his recollections concerning C.N.A.C. (China National Aviation Corporation). Sometime in 1968, Mrs. Bixby had about 20 more copies of this book republished. Professor William Leary ([[Book:The Dragon's Wings|The Dragon's Wings]]) of the University of Georgia at Athens oversaw this project.
Harold Bixby's grandson, Benjamin C. Barrett, recently authored a book, [[Book:Harold M. Bixby|Harold M. Bixby: The Spirit Behind the Spirit of St. Louis]]. +
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Yankee on the Yangtze covers the life and history of Ernest M. Allie Allison. This fascinating and historically significant man learned to fly in WWI with the U.S. Air Corps. Later he flew the first U.S. transcontinental route with the U.S. Air Mail Service and helped open China to commercial aviation in 1929 as Operations Manager for China National Aviation Corporation.
While in China he made the inaugural Hankou to Shanghai flight, surveyed new air routes, and opened Yangtze Gorges for tourism. While in China he also worked with General Clare Chennault, became advisor to the Aeronautical Commission, and flew for Chiang Kai-shek before and during the Japanese invasion.
Upon his return to the U.S. he worked for Boeing and was the chief test pilot for B-29. He returned to China in 1947 as C.N.A.C. Operations Manager and Vice-President-elect, until 1949 when Mao Zedong declared Peoples Republic. Yankee on the Yangtze tells of these exploits of and the accomplishments by Ernest M. Allie Allison. +