I’ll Fly Away: A World War II Pilot’s Lifetime of Adventures From Biplanes to Jumbo Jets
by Jack Race with William F. Hallstead, University of Scranton Press, Scranton, Pa., 2006, $20 softcover.
Jack Race soloed in an Aeronca C-3 at the age of 18 and by 22 was a military pilot in WWII with the U.S. Army Air Corps. After the Germans’ defeat he was selected to fly General Alfred Jodl to the ceremony for the surrender of the Third Reich. His career continued as a pilot’s pilot through various jobs including crop duster, bush pilot, chief pilot instructor for Ariana Afghan Airlines and 34 years with Pan Am. At age 68 he retraced Charles Lindbergh’s 20,000-mile goodwill tour to all 48 states in the continental U.S. and two years later became chief pilot for the Orbis flying eye hospital.
Race’s 60 years of adventures from puddle-jumper to Boeing 747 are the stuff all pilots see themselves undertaking but rarely have the opportunity to do. Pilots and nonpilots alike will enjoy this engaging biography.
Originally published in the May 2007 issue of Aviation History. To subscribe, click here.
