The Saga of the Tin Goose : The Story of the Ford Trimotor [Paperback]

David A. Weiss (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: January 1996 | ISBN-10: 0963429922 | ISBN-13: 978-0963429926 | Edition: Book and Access

It was the brainchild of Henry Ford and inventor William Bushnell Stout. It was the Ford Trimotor, afftectionally called the Tin Goose, the first all-metal passenger plane built in the U.S. Only 200 were ever manufactured, but they launched the nation's first regular scheduled air flights, introducing almost everything we have in U.S. air travel today--from stewardesses to meals aboard planes to concrete runways and lighted airfields. Byrd flew over the South Pole in a Tin Goose, FDR dreamed up the New Deal flying in one of these planes to his Presidential nomination in 1932. Lindbergh inaugurated the nation's first transcontinental air passenger service in another one. All the companies that became major American airlines started up with this plane,and when the Boeings and Douglas took over, the Ford trimotors unbelievabky kept flying commercially for another half century, hauling mining equipment over the Andes, ferrying passengers from Put--in-Bay Island in Lake Erie to the mainland, and dusting crops in the Midwest. This edition is an updated version of the orignal hard-cover edition published in 1971, and the final chapter tells where the remaining Tin Gooses can be seen and flown today..

Editorial Reviews

Review

"David Ansel Weiss has written lovingly and with a professional storyteller skill of this almost legendary plane that changed fledging aviation's fly-by-night operations into the giant airline industry of today." -- St. Louis Globe-Democrat

"This is not only the story of Mr. Ford's venerable trimotor, it is a highly readable and complete history of commercial aviation and scheduled airlines." -- Aviation

"This tightly organized factual presentaqtion, enhanced by old photographs, coveys a sense of the precariousness of early aviation... Aviation buffs will find plenty of detail on the design and performance of the trimotor and other famous planes." -- Kirkus

This lively story of the Ford triomotor airplane appears in a newly updated, revised edition to introduce new audiences to this story of the first passenger airplane produced in 1928. Only 200 'Tin Goose' planes were ever manufactured, but these made aviation history, pioneering commercial flight runs, airplane ticketing, runway design, and other forerunners to modern flight. -- Midwest Book Review

About the Author

Bon in Cumberland, Maryland, David A. Weiss came to New York after World War II to embark on what became a successful writing career, during which he ghostwrote columns for Walter Winchell, did special publicity writing for Universal Pictures, published dozens of articles in magazines incuding the Readers' Digest and Sports Illustrated, and authored three nonfiction books, The Great Fire of London, The Saga of the Tin Goose, and How To Get Your Product Into Supermarkets (co-author). He also founded and was president for 25 years of Packaged Facts, Inc, one of the nation's leading publishers of syndicated market studies.

Product Details

• Paperback
• Publisher: Cumberland Enterprises; Book and Access edition (January 1996)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0963429922
• ISBN-13: 978-0963429926
• Product Dimensions: 8.3 x 5.3 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 12 ounces
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,900,789 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)