Lingering Contrails of the Big Square

"No man can say how far it is to the top of the sky. But those who have fought the enemy in the blue upper levels where the vapor trails form, and where the mist between life and death is thin, believe that men like Castle fly on at that high altitude from which none return to earth." Harry Slater on Brigadier General Frederick W. Castle.







Harry E. Slater. LINGERING CONTRAILS OF THE BIG SQUARE A. A HISTORY OF THE 94TH BOMB GROUP (H).1942-1945. Carley Publishing, Tennessee 1980.

Current Prices
$220-$350/£100-£180

AVIATION /MILITARY HISTORY AND WARFARE
Much wanted by veteran campaigners (and their families) in USA and also in East Anglia (UK). Living in Suffolk as I do, I was asked for a copy by my postman and then again by a guy who came to fix the roof. Quite a poetic title for a military book. Mission by mission account by US pilot who was there. According to the one Amazon review (by a 94th veteran) I believe it is the best acount of a Bomb Group I've read and I've read many...' Amazon have no copies by the way. Mainly concerns the B17 bombers flown on audacious missions over Germany by the 94th a USAF group based at Rougham, Suffolk in WW2.

VALUE? I actually got a copy for one of these chaps and it cost a hefty $120 about 5 years ago. Since then the book has gone to ground and I suspect it is now worth more than twice that. No copies seen on ebay or the megabook malls. As I recall it's a large format paperback, not thin and well illustrated. Carley the publishers are probably a printer who took on the book, they appear to have published nothing else. The other wanted book in the WW2 ' Yanks in East Anglia' category was 'The Yoxford Boys' about the 357th group also based in Suffolk: the original Aero 1971 edition has been revised and reprinted in 2004 and prices have plummeted. [ W/Q *** ]



STOP PRESS. So unfindable is this work that an internet con man has stepped forward to offer non existent copies and pocket the money. I found this at a book discussion site:- 'Do not buy anyhing offered for sale by Daniel T----. He is a fraud. I negotiated the purchase of "Lingering Contrails of the Big Square " with him in December. After sending the payment and getting verification that he had picked it up, I heard nothing more from him. Let this be a warning to anyone dealing with this thief. Bil W---.' Someone else paid this lowly web grifter 'good money' for the book and never received it. Presumably this is going on with other hard to find the books, if the desire is strong enough a trickster is born to rip readers off. These people are worse than relisters, neither of them have the book but the relister will at least try to locate a copy and (if they want to keep relisting) will refund the money when they fail. Please post any other instances of this kind of scam in our comments field.

Captain Joseph W. Kittinger "The Long Lonely Leap" 1961

In an open gondola hung beneath a shimmering cloud of plastic, a man ascends to the awesome height of 102,800 feet. He looks about him at a world that is not the world of man. The atmosphere of his planet lies beneath his feet. The velvet blackness of space is close enough to reach out and touch. He is absolutely alone. Then he jumps . . . ( From the blurb of 'The Long Lonely Leap' 196i)


Captain Joseph W. Kittinger, Jr., USAF (with Martin Caidin.) THE LONG, LONELY LEAP. E.P. Dutton & Company, N.Y. 1961.

Current Selling Prices
$350-$600? /£180-£300?

AVIATION / SPACE TRAVEL
Highly uncommon regularly published book that is much sought after. There are no copies currently for sale online. Back in the 1950s and early 1960s, well before liquid-fuel rockets were fully operational, a small group of military men made the first exploratory trips into the upper stratosphere to the edge of outer space in tiny capsules suspended beneath plastic balloons. They are sometimes referred to as 'the pre-astronauts.' Doctors, physicists, meteorologists, engineers, astronomers, and test pilots, they made great personal sacrifices and took great risks for the promise of high adventure and the opportunity to uncover a few secrets of the universe. One of their number, Capt. Joseph Kittinger, rode a balloon up to 103,000 feet in an open gondola and then stepped out and freefell to Earth, becoming the only person to break the sound barrier without a vehicle. Kittinger wrote the book with Martin Caidin, aviation writer, pilot, and author of over two dozen books, the two men flew and spent months together to re-create the amazing events of this story.



A good summary was posted on the Corinth Information Database in 1995:

"Beginning with his boyhood and youth in Florida, where he explored wilderness waterways and was a professional speedboat racer, Captain Kittinger describes his experiences as an Air Force aviation cadet, fighterbomber pilot and test pilot. In 1957 he soared to 96,000 feet in a sealed capsule as test pilot of Project Man High, the high-altitude balloon program studying man's ability to function usefully as part of a man-machine system in a near-space environment. Then, after work with the Escape Section of the Aerospace Medical Laboratory, Captain Kittinger became Chief and volunteer test subject of Project Excelsior, the program aimed at developing a parachute by which a man could survive escape at extreme altitudes. To put the new Beaupre chute, and related equipment developed by the team, to practical test, Captain Kittinger made his three great jumps-Excelsior I, II, and III.

These courageous jumps reached their climax in his famous record leap from the very edge of space itself, almost 20 miles above the earth. This drop included a free fall lasting more than an incredible 4 1/2 minutes, during which Captain Kittinger reached a falling speed of 614 miles per hour before his parachute finally opened at 18,000 feet. Captain Kittinger describes the preparations for the balloon ascent, and the actual ascent itself. He tells of floating for eleven minutes in the alien world of space, 102,800 feet up. Then . . . the descent. Using an actual tape recording of his words as he fell, Kittinger relates his impressions, vividly re-creating this magnificent and terrifying experience."

In later life Joe Kittinger served three combat tours during the Vietnam War, flying a total of 483 missions, On March 1, 1972, he shot down a MIG-21 in air-to-air combat, and was later downed himself on May 11, 1972, just before the end of his tour. He spent 11 months as a prisoner of war in the "Hanoi Hilton". He was not a good prisoner.

VALUE? I hesitate to say 'sky high' but this appears to be an unfindable book. Wikipedia, which posits a reprint in November 2005 (didn't happen) says that 'surviving copies are expensive.' A National Geographic from December 1960 has an article about his jump and that can command $50. His signed photo can go for between $150 and $240. In the hands of a dealer from Ventura one could imagine a four figure price. No copies appear to have passed through ebay. A reprint could still happen- but try $500 for a fab copy of the 1961 first. [ W/Q ***]

The Aluminum Trail by Chick Marrs Quinn

This is part of a fascinating genre of books, self published military histories. They are not like the buckram bound regimental histories lettered gilt on spine and front cover with crests etc. They are more likely to be paperbacks written by old soldiers and sometimes their widows, many came out of WW2 in US and UK and are often very hard to find.

Chick Marrs Quinn. THE ALUMINUM TRAIL (CHINA-BURMA-INDIA-WORLD WAR II, HOW AND WHERE THEY DIED. Self Published? USA (FLA?) 1989.

Current Prices $200+/£100+


AVIATION/ MILITARY HISTORY AND WARFARE.
Not a lot known about this wanted book except that it's about US aerial operations in the Pacific Area in WW2 and CMQ was a woman last heard of living in Lake City Florida. The book is dedicated to 1st Lt. Loyal Stuart Marrs, Jr., Chick's husband who was killed February 27, 1945. A letter to her from someone at the China National Aviation Corporation site in 2005 was returned unopened. The CNAC site has good info on many other books about US aviation in the Indo - China area in this period. The 'aluminum trail' title refers to the pattern of air crashes in these difficult regions, especially the Himalayas. I suspect persons who lost relations and loved ones flying so far from home eagerly want this rare book and not a few libraries.

VALUE? Not on web and I have little idea of price. Pretty scarce. One chap on the excellent wantedbooks.com site is offering $25 to $50 for a copy for his 85 year old uncle. Probably could add quite a bit to that. As uberbookmeister AMW Rosenbach said 'a book is worth what somebody is willing to pay..' or was it 'A book is worth what you can get for it?" [ W/Q *** ]

Update note/ May 2007. I have had several emails from old soldiers and their sons looking for this. It is resolutely unfindable although a copy seems to have gone through ebay recently for about $50 so watch the skies. They should reprint it. Meanwhile here is a verse from the book, probably a dedication at the front:

A steak of silver in the sky...the engines roar...propellers try...
To lift the giant screaming plane...above the mountains drenched with rain..
Black ominous clouds and gale winds blow...amid the ice and swirling snow..
As plane and crew, with every breath...tries to win a fight with death...
To climb above the snow capped peak...a place not far for the very weak...
The plane is in a mighty grip...the crew can hear the metal rip...
As suction lifts them like a kite...above the peaks into the night...
Then, just as quickly dropped like snow...into the jutting rocks below...
Time has run out for plotted goals...a cry aloud,"God save our souls"!...
A crash like thunder, a flash of light...then silence in the blackened night...
Crumpled engines, wings and tail...help pave the "Hump's" Aluminum Trail...
A dog tag here...a jacket there, a picture worn by love and care...
A parachute unopened lay...no time to jump, no time to pray...
In this far, forgotten place, of jungles, mountains, rocks and space...
The wreckage lay like broken toys...discarded by mischievous boys...
And boys they were of tender years...and families weep in silent tears...
To know the sacrifice they made...the part their gift for freedom played...
Lieutenants, Captains, Sergeants too...Privates, maintenance, or crew...
Whatever rank, whatever job...they did their best with each heart throb...
Some gave their lives to save a friend...a brother to the very end...
They gave their lives, so we might live...what more can any person give.

Astra Castra

An old favourite, a style of book that used to be known for no good reason as 'roast beef' - a coinage of bookseller Martin Stone to denote sizable, worthy oldish non fiction on robust subjects like early aviation, roads, towers, pirates, local history etc., This used to be on wants list and proudly displayed at book fairs..sic transit...

Hatton Turnor. ASTRA CASTRA. EXPERIMENTS AND ADVENTURES IN THE ATMOSPHERE. Chapman and Hall, London 1865


EARLY AVIATION /BALLOONING
A desirable book but paradoxically not as much wanted as in days of yore - like the 80s when a book scout like X. Driffield would hit the Portsmouth Road mumbling Astra Castra, Globe by the Way Book and Scatological Rites of All Nations to every bemused bookseller en route. Autre temps, autre bores. A big ballooning book, beautiful to behold in the original publisher's cloth with a gilt Pegasus on front and back. Lists the first 500 aeronauts, is large, heavy and finely illustrated with 40 plates, mostly photozincographs. It is worth less than a signed Lemony Snicket but is a bit more impressive. Could find no image of the book so have put attractive Montgolfier image from the National Air and Space museum (many thanks.)

VALUE? Used to go for £150 20 years ago now goes for nearly double that and a bit more for copies in superior condition. A copy was auctioned in LA Feb 2006 and made a mere $179, one assumes it was rebound or shot. An unpleasant rebound copy with a starting price $799 failed to get a bid on ebay in June 06. Several better copies on ABE at less but many ebayers seem unaware of other book sites. Turns up signed but do not pay a premium for that, signatures tend only to kick-start prices when the dude is famous.

Current Prices $350-$750 / £180 - £375 Want level 10 - 20 Modest