Humanity has been defying gravity with powered vehicles for less than a century, and earlier with gliders and balloons with mixed success. Our aviation history is of such complexity and density that it can stagger anyone who studies it closely. Harrison (history, Hunter Coll.), whose field is ordinarily Asian history, has produced a densely packed panorama on a specialized and extraordinary subject. He portrays a century's parade of victories in rapid succession with defeats and setbacks sprinkled around to keep us humble and courage and ingenuity enough for a dozen lifetimes of study. He also tells the story of a science and technology and so requires a seemingly endless cataract of facts, statistics, dates, and numbers. It is inevitable that in such an all-encompassing history of flight, the inevitable errors creep in, like Ben Franklin's use of a balloon for his lightning experiments instead of a kite or the date of the Absolute Speed Record (off by a day). But these are swept away in the headlong rush to tell the story of the development of the most important invention of our century. Recommended especially for public libraries.?Mel D. Lane, Sacramento, Cal.
Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
From Booklist
Harrison's overview of aviation history tries to take in everything from Daedalus to TWA flight 800 and from the Frisbee to the space shuttle in less than 400 pages. If it does not succeed, it is still an admirable failure. Former air force pilot Harrison clearly loves the miracle of flight and those who have brought it about, and he tries to do justice to as many persons and machines as possible. So he marshals a vast amount of raw data, but poor organization and some glaring errors suggest the effort needed more editing than it got. On the other hand, Harrison offers an imposing and up-to-date reading list, and he totally avoids the technophobic condescension that mars much recent academic material on aviation history. Hardly perfect, this volume is still useful and definitely fun. Roland Green --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
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