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Girls of flight city / by Heath, Lorraine,author.;
1941. A talented flier, Jessie Lovelace yearns for a career in aviation. When the civilian flight school in her small Texas town begins to clandestinely train British pilots for the RAF, she fights to become an instructor. But the task isn't without its perils of near-misses and death. Faced with the weight of her responsibilities, she finds solace with a British officer who knows firsthand the heavy price paid in war ... until he returns to the battles he never truly left behind. Rhonda Monroe might not be skilled in the air but can give a trainee a wild ride in a flight simulator. Fearing little, she dares to jeopardize everything for a forbidden relationship with a charismatic airman. Innocent and fun-loving Kitty Lovelace, Jessie's younger sister, adores dancing with these charming newcomers, realizing too late the risks they pose to her heart. As the war intensifies and America becomes involved, the Girls of Flight City do their part to bring a victorious end to the conflict, pouring all their energy into preparing the young cadets to take to the skies and defeat the dangers that await. And lives from both sides of the Atlantic will be forever changed by love and loss.
Subjects: Historical fiction.; Novels.; Great Britain. Royal Air Force; Aeronautics; Air pilots, Military; Flight training; Man-woman relationships; Women air pilots; World War, 1939-1945;
Available copies: 2 / Total copies: 2
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Battle of Britain : Canadian airmen in their finest hour / by Barris, Ted,author.;
Includes bibliographical references and index."The gripping and heroic story of fighter pilots defending the skies over Britain from unprecedented Nazi attack. For 113 terrifying days in 1940, Nazi Germany's air force, the Luftwaffe, threw everything it had at Great Britain in hopes of early victory in World War II. The task of defending southern England from airborne attack fell to pilots in the Royal Air Force, supplemented in their darkest hour by more than 100 flyers from Canada. These Canadians, some from famous families, some straight off the farm, served in forty-seven different Battle of Britain squadrons. Now, for the first time, bestselling military historian Ted Barris tells the riveting story of their crucial role in this do-or-die-battle: how they accounted for 130 German aircraft destroyed, another thirty probably destroyed and more than seventy damaged, with twenty pilots dying in action and twelve awarded Distinguished Flying Crosses. The Battle of Britain, And Canada's Gallant Airmen is a must for enthusiasts of military and aviation history."--
Subjects: Biographies.; Personal narratives.; Great Britain. Royal Air Force.; Britain, Battle of, Great Britain, 1940.; Fighter pilots; World War, 1939-1945; World War, 1939-1945;
Available copies: 0 / Total copies: 1
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Dam busters : the true story of the inventors and airmen who led the devastating raid to smash the German dams in 1943 / by Holland, James,1970-;
Includes bibliographical references, filmography, Internet addresses and index.LSC
Subjects: Wallis, Barnes, 1887-1979.; Gibson, Guy.; Great Britain. Royal Air Force. Squadron, 617; Great Britain. Royal Air Force. Squadron, 617; Operation Chastise, 1943.; World War, 1939-1945; World War, 1939-1945; Dams;
© c2012., Atlantic Monthly Press,
Available copies: 1 / Total copies: 1
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Chastise : the Dambusters story 1943 / by Hastings, Max,author.;
Includes bibliographical references and index.A brand new history of the Dambusters raid from best-selling and critically acclaimed military historian, Max Hastings. Operation Chastise, the destruction of the Mohne and Eder dams in northwest Germany by the RAF's 617 Squadron on the night of 16/17 May 1943, was an epic that has passed into Britain's national legend. Max Hastings grew up embracing the story, the classic 1955 movie and the memory of Guy Gibson, the 24-year-old wing-commander who led the raid. In the 21st Century, however, he urges that we should see the dambusters in much more complex shades. The aircrew's heroism was entirely real, as was the brilliance of Barnes Wallis, inventor of the ‘bouncing bombs'. But commanders who promised their young fliers that success could shorten the war fantasised as ruthlessly as they did about the entire bomber offensive. Some 1,400 civilians perished in the biblical floods that swept through the Mohne valley, more than half of them Russian and Polish women, slave labourers. Hastings vividly describes the evolution of Wallis' bomb, and of the squadron which broke the dams. But he also portrays in harrowing detail those swept away by the torrents. He argues that what modern Germans call the Mohnekatastrophe imposed on the Nazi war machine temporary disruption, rather than a crippling blow. Ironically, Air Marshal Sir Arthur ‘Bomber' Harris gained much of the public credit, though he bitterly opposed Chastise as a distraction from his city-burning blitz. Harris also made perhaps the operation's biggest mistake-- failure to launch a conventional attack on the huge post-raid repair operation which could have transformed the impact of the dam breaches on Ruhr industry. Here once again is a dramatic retake on familiar history by a master of the art. Hastings sets the Dams Raid in the big picture of the bomber offensive and of the Second World War, with moving portraits of the young airmen, so many of whom died; of Barnes Wallis; the monstrous Harris; the tragic Guy Gibson, together with superb narrative of the action of one of the most extraordinary episodes in British history.
Subjects: Great Britain. Royal Air Force. Squadron, 617; Dams; Operation Chastise, 1943.; World War, 1939-1945; World War, 1939-1945;
Available copies: 1 / Total copies: 1
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Over the wire : a Canadian pilot's memoir of war and survival as a POW / by Carswell, Andrew,1923-;
Subjects: Carswell, Andrew, 1923-; Canada. Royal Canadian Air Force; Great Britain. Royal Air Force. Bomber Command; Stalag VIII B Lamsdorf.; Air pilots, Military; Prisoners of war; Prisoners of war; World War, 1939-1945; World War, 1939-1945;
© c2011., J. Wiley & Sons Canada,
Available copies: 1 / Total copies: 1
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Dam busters : Canadian airmen and the secret raid against Nazi Germany / by Barris, Ted,author.; Mansbridge, Peter,writer of foreword.;
Includes bibliographical references and index.May 16, 1943, was a night that changed WWII. Nineteen Lancaster bombers filled with 133 hand-picked and specially trained airmen took off on a night mission code-named Operation Chastise; their targets - the Ruhr River dams - whose massive water reservoirs powered Nazi Germany's military industrial complex. This mission cost the lives of fifty-three airmen, including fourteen Canadians. Based on personal accounts, flight logs, maps and photographs of the Canadians involved, 'Dam Busters' recounts the dramatic story of these young Commonwealth bomber crews.
Subjects: Great Britain. Royal Air Force. Squadron, 617; Operation Chastise, 1943.; Air pilots, Military; Air pilots, Military; World War, 1939-1945; World War, 1939-1945; World War, 1939-1945; Dams;
Available copies: 0 / Total copies: 1
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The Guinea Pig Club : Archibald McIndoe and the RAF in World War II / by Mayhew, E. R.(Emily R.),author.; Mayhew, E. R.(Emily R.).Reconstruction of warriors.;
Includes bibliographical references and index."The history of the Guinea Pig Club, the band of British, Polish, and Czech airmen who were seriously burned in aeroplane fires, is a truly inspiring, spine-tingling tale. Plastic surgery was in its infancy before the Second World War. The most rudimentary techniques were only known to a few surgeons worldwide. The Allies were tremendously fortunate in having the maverick surgeon Archibald McIndoe nicknamed "the Boss" or "the Maestro" operating at a small hospital in East Grinstead in the south of England. McIndoe constructed a medical infrastructure from scratch. After arguing with his superiors, he set up a revolutionary new treatment regime. Uniquely concerned with the social environment, or "holistic care," McIndoe also enlisted the help of the local civilian population. He rightly secured his group of patients dubbed the Guinea Pig Club--an honoured place in society as heroes of Britain's war. For the first time, official records have been used to explain fully how and why this remarkable relationship developed between the Guinea Pig Club, the RAF, and the Home Front. First-person recollections bring to life the heroism of the airmen with incredible clarity."--
Subjects: Biographies.; McIndoe, Archibald Hector, Sir, 1900-1960.; Guinea Pig Club.; Great Britain. Royal Air Force; World War, 1939-1945; Plastic surgeons; Airmen; Disabled veterans; Surgery, Plastic; Burns and scalds;
Available copies: 1 / Total copies: 1
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Battle of the Atlantic : gauntlet to victory / by Barris, Ted,author.;
Includes bibliographical references and index.The Battle of the Atlantic, Canada's longest continuous military engagement of the Second World War, lasted 2,074 days, claiming the lives of more than 4,000 men and women in the Royal Canadian Navy, the Royal Canadian Air Force and the Canadian merchant navy The years 2019 to 2025 mark the eightieth anniversary of the longest battle of the Second World War, the Battle of the Atlantic. It also proved to be the war's most critical and dramatic battle of attrition. For five and a half years, German surface warships and submarines attempted to destroy Allied trans-Atlantic convoys, most of which were escorted by Royal Canadian destroyers and corvettes, as well as aircraft of the Royal Canadian Air Force. Throwing deadly U-boat "wolf packs" in the paths of the convoys, the German Kriegsmarine almost succeeded in cutting off this vital lifeline to a beleaguered Great Britain. In 1939, the Royal Canadian Navy went to war with exactly thirteen warships and about 3,500 regular servicemen and reservists. During the desperate days and nights of the Battle of the Atlantic, the RCN grew to 400 fighting ships and over 100,000 men and women in uniform. By V-E Day in 1945, it had become the fourth largest navy in the world. The story of Canada's naval awakening from the dark, bloody winters of 1939-1942, to be "ready, aye, ready" to challenge the U-boats and drive them to defeat, is a Canadian wartime saga for the ages. While Canadians think of the Great War battle of Vimy Ridge as the country's coming of age, it was the Battle of the Atlantic that proved Canada's gauntlet to victory and a nation-building milestone.
Subjects: Canada. Royal Canadian Navy; World War, 1939-1945; World War, 1939-1945;
Available copies: 1 / Total copies: 1
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