Author Description

"This book covers British Royal Air Force pilots trained at Falcon Field, Arizona during WWII. Publisher's In one of the most audacious experiments of WWII an experiment born of the greatest necessity, a Hollywood corporation hired civilian pilots to teach British aviation cadets how to fly United States Army airplanes. Training began in June 1941 six months before the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor officially brought America into the war. More than 2000 Royal Air Force (RAF) cadets trained at Falcon Field in Mesa, Arizona, during WWII. Those cadets spent over 300,000 hours in the air and flew a distance of forty-five million miles. That training would eventually put them in the fighters and bombers over France and Germany where their final exam would be administered by the German Luftwaffe. Over 180 photographs and dozens of first-hand accounts complement this memorable exploration into the joint effort made by Great Britain and the United States to fill the immense need for trained RAF pilots. Class rosters, reconstructed in the Appendices, detail the WWII activities of Falcon graduates and give long overdue credit in print to those who trained at Falcon. Those boys and thousands more like them won the war. "Excellent research and documentation. The RAF in Arizona, Falcon Field 1941-1945 should be in any serious military aviation collection and would be a valued gift for anyone interested in RAF history or Arizona history." Michael Saunders, North Georgia College (The Senior Military College of Georgia)" -- Publisher's description.