Warbird Philosophy

Aviation Autobiographies

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Introduction

Work on this project began as early as 24 October 2018, when a list of the same name was created on Amazon. This page is based in large part on the aerospace section of the list of autobiographies Wikipedia page. Said section was entirely self-created, so its inclusion on this website is appropriate.

However, the content of this page may differ from the aforementioned article, as inclusion criteria (i.e. notability requirements) are not in place here. Furthermore, the decision was made to focus solely on individuals involved in atmospheric flight, and not spaceflight.

Only a single book is listed for each individual. The years listed are the date of publication of the first edition, as further revisions without additional input from the author are more likely to introduce errors or factual inaccuracies. However, if a work with significantly different content is published later it will be included instead, as it is expected that it will be more comprehensive due to covering a large span of the author's life. The chief method of distinguishing between a new work and a revision, new edition, or translation of an earlier copy is that a significantly different title is used. If the work was originally published in a non-English language, the English language title is listed first, followed by the foreign language title in parentheses.

Confirmation of publication dates is mainly performed through searches of the WorldCat database. However, in a few cases confirmation was made by consulting images of pages on sales listings on online auctions or book selling websites.

In the event a book was written with a coauthor or published posthumously, it is noted in a footnote.

Autobiographies

Author Title Year
Alberto Santos-Dumont My Airships: The Story of My Life 1904
Manfred von Richthofen The Red Fighter Pilot 1917
Billy Bishop Winged Warfare 1918
James McCudden Five Years in the Royal Flying Corps 1919
René Fonck My Fights (Mes Combats) 1919
Richard E. Byrd Skyward 1928
Clarence Chamberlin Record Flights 1928
Frank Hawks Speed 1931
Amelia Earhart The Fun of It 1933
Duncan Grinnell-Milne Wind in the Wires 1933
C. W. A. Scott C. W. A. Scott's Book: The Life and Mildenhall-Melbourne Flight of C.W.A. Scott 1934
Jimmy Collins Test Pilot 1935
Beirne Lay Jr. I Wanted Wings 1937
Frank Glasgow Tinker Some Still Live 1938
Louise Thaden High, Wide and Frightened 1938
Igor Sikorsky The Story of the Winged-S 1939
Richard Hillary The Last Enemy 1940
Beryl Markham West with the Night 1942
Ted W. Lawson Thirty Seconds Over Tokyo 1943
Guy Gibson Enemy Coast Ahead 1946
Arthur Harris Bomber Offensive 1947
Henry H. Arnold Global Mission 1949
Claire Lee Chennault Way of a Fighter: The Memoirs of Claire Lee Chennault 1949
George Kenney General Kenney Reports: A Personal History of the Pacific War 1949
Ivan Kozhedub I Serve the Motherland (Служу Родине) 1949
Hans-Ulrich Rudel Nevertheless (Trotzdem)[a] 1949
Dick Grace Visibility Unlimited 1950
William Bushnell Stout So Away I Went! 1951
Pierre Clostermann The Big Show (Le Grand Cirque) 1951
Hanna Reitsch Flying is My Life (Fliegen, Mein Leben) 1951
Adolf Galland The First and the Last 1953
Ernst Heinkel Stormy Life (Stürmisches Leben) 1953
Heinz Knoke I Flew for the Führer 1953
Hugh Henry Home Popham Sea Flight: A Fleet Air Arm Pilot's Story 1954
Nevil Shute Slide Rule: Autobiography of an Engineer 1954
Bill Bridgeman The Lonely Sky 1955
Eino Luukkanen Fighter Over Finland (Hävittäjälentäjänä Kahdessa Sodassa) 1956
Johnnie Johnson Wing Leader 1956
John Slessor The Central Blue: Recollections and Reflections 1956
Saburō Sakai Samurai![b] 1957
Pappy Boyington Baa Baa Black Sheep 1958
Robert S. Johnson Thunderbolt! 1958
Alan Deere Nine Lives 1959
Albert Scott Crossfield Always Another Dawn: The Story of a Rocket Test Pilot 1960
Eric Brown Wings on My Sleeve 1961
Geoffrey de Havilland Sky Fever: The Autobiography of Sir Geoffrey de Havilland 1961
John Braham Night Fighter 1961
Nancy Bird Born to Fly 1961
Bud Mahurin Honest John 1962
Curtis LeMay Mission with LeMay: My Story[c] 1965
Arthur Tedder With Prejudice: The War Memoirs of Marshal of the Royal Air Force, Lord Tedder 1966
José Larios Combat over Spain: Memoirs of a Nationalist Fighter Pilot, 1936-1939 1966
Eddie Rickenbacker Rickenbacker: An Autobiography 1967
Alexander Sergeyevich Yakovlev The Purpose of Life (Цель жизни)[d] 1967
Benjamin Foulois From the Wright Brothers to the Astronauts: The Memoirs of Benjamin D. Foulois 1968
George William Goddard Overview: A Lifelong Adventure in Aerial Photography 1969
George Meager My Airship Flights, 1915-1930 1970
Francis Gary Powers Operation Overflight: The U-2 Spy Pilot Tells His Story for the First Time[e] 1970
Raymond Collishaw Air Command: A Fighter Pilot's Story 1973
Donald Wilson Wooing Peponi: My Odyssey through Many Years 1973
Jan Zumbach Mister Brown[f] 1973
Arthur Lee No Parachute: A Fighter Pilot in World War I 1974
Cecil Arthur Lewis Never Look Back: An Attempt at Autobiography 1974
Igor Kaberov Swastika in the Gunsight (В прицеле свастика) 1975
Charles Lamb War in a Stringbag 1977
Alan Cobham A Time to Fly 1978
Richard S. Drury My Secret War 1979
Alex Henshaw Sigh for a Merlin: Testing the Spitfire[g] 1979
Murray Peden A Thousand Shall Fall 1979
Jean Batten Alone in the Sky 1979
George Gay Sole Survivor 1980
Wladek Gnyś First Kill: A Fighter Pilot's Autobiography 1981
Jack Jefford Winging It! 1981
William R. Dunn Fighter Pilot: The First American Ace of World War II 1982
Duke Cunningham Fox Two: The Story of America's First Ace in Vietnam[h] 1984
Gerhard Neumann Herman the German: Enemy Alien U.S. Army Master Sergeant 1984
Stanley Hooker Not Much of an Engineer 1985
Al Mooney The Al Mooney Story: They All Fly Through the Same Air[i] 1985
Chuck Yeager Yeager: An Autobiography[j] 1985
Roald Dahl Going Solo 1986
Haywood S. Hansell The Strategic Air War Against Germany and Japan: A Memoir 1986
Jacqueline Cochran Jackie Cochran: An Autobiography[k][l] 1987
Alberto Briganti Beyond the Clouds the Serene: Memories of Forty Years of Flight and Adventure (Oltre le Nubi il Sereno: Ricordi di Quarant'anni di Volo e di Avventura) 1988
Robert Lee Scott Jr. The Day I Owned the Sky[m] 1988
Fred Weick From the Ground Up 1988
John Thomas Blackburn The Jolly Rogers: The Story of Tom Blackburn and Navy Fighting Squadron VF-17 1989
Hugh Dundas Flying Start: A Fighter Pilot's War Years 1989
Kelly Johnson Kelly: More Than My Share of It All 1989
Boone Guyton Whistling Death: The Test Pilot's Story of the F4U Corsair 1990
Bud Anderson To Fly and Fight 1991
Jimmy Doolittle I Could Never Be So Lucky Again[n] 1991
Gabby Gabreski Gabby: A Fighter Pilot's Life[o] 1991
Hajo Herrmann Eagle's Wings 1991
Brian Shul Sled Driver: Flying the World's Fastest Jet 1991
Joe Foss A Proud American: The Autobiography of Joe Foss[p] 1992
Tex Johnson Tex Johnston: Jet-Age Test Pilot[q] 1992
Lawrence A. Hyland Call Me Pat: The Autobiography of the Man Howard Hughes Chose to Lead Hughes Aircraft 1993
Diana Barnato Walker Spreading My Wings: One of Britain's Top Women Pilots Tells Her Remarkable Story 1994
Marion Eugene Carl Pushing the Envelope: The Career of Fighter Ace and Test Pilot Marion Carl[r] 1994
Neal Vernon Loving Lovings Love: A Black American's Experiences in Aviation 1994
Ben Rich Skunk Works: A Personal Memoir of My Years at Lockheed[s] 1994
No Kum-Sok A MiG-15 to Freedom: Memoir of the Wartime North Korean Defector Who First Delivered the Secret Fighter Jet to the Americans in 1953[t] 1996
Charles W. Dryden A-Train: Memoirs of a Tuskegee Airman 1997
James V. Hartinger From One Stripe to Four Stars 1997
Boris Sergievsky Airplanes, Women, and Song: Memoirs of a Fighter Ace, Test Pilot, and Adventurer 1998
Fred J. Olivi Decision at Nagasaki: The Mission That Almost Failed[u] 1998
Frank E. Petersen Into the Tiger's Jaw: America's First Black Marine Aviator[v] 1998
Paul Tibbets Return of The Enola Gay 1998
Jeffrey Quill Spitfire: A Test Pilot's Story 1998
James Anderson Arctic Bush Pilot: From Navy Combat to Flying Alaska's Northern Wilderness[w] 2000
Frederick Libby Horses Don't Fly: A Memoir of World War I 2000
Roland Beamont The Years Flew Past: 40 Years at the Leading Edge of Aviation 2001
Robert K. Morgan The Man Who Flew the Memphis Belle: Memoir of a WWII Bomber Pilot[x] 2001
Peter Masefield Flight Path: The Autobiography of Sir Peter Masefield[y] 2002
Donald L. Mallick Smell of Kerosene: A Test Pilot's Odyssey 2003
Rex Terpening Bent Props & Blow Pots 2003
Bernard F. Fisher Beyond the Call of Duty: The Story of an American Hero 2004
Colin Downes By the Skin of my Teeth: The Memoirs of an RAF Mustang Pilot in World War II and of Flying Sabres with USAF in Korea 2005
Corky Meyer Corky Meyer's Flight Journal: A Test Pilot's Tales of Dodging Disasters Just in Time[z] 2005
Clayton Kelly Gross Live Bait: WWII Memories of an Undefeated Fighter Ace 2006
Joe Sutter 747: Creating the World's First Jumbo Jet and Other Adventures from a Life in Aviation[aa] 2006
Captain Nicholas Gravino, Jr. A Pilot's Memoirs: From the Ground Up 2007
Leland Snow Putting Dreams to Flight 2008
Anna Yegorova Red Sky, Black Death: A Soviet Woman Pilot's Memoir of the Eastern Front 2009
John Freeborn Tiger Cub: A 74 Squadron Fighter Pilot in World War II[ab] 2009
Mitsuo Fuchida For That One Day: The Memoirs of Mitsuo Fuchida, the Commander of the Attack on Pearl Harbor[ac] 2011
Wayne A. Warner One Trip Too Many: A Pilot's Memoirs of 38 Months in Combat over Laos and Vietnam 2011
Don Volz A Pilot's Story: An Autobiography of a Pilot 2012
Mick Greene The Life and Adventures of an Old Bold Pilot: Skill, Courage, Luck 2012
Theodore R. Wiebe Bread of Tears 2012
Albert J. DeGroote A Flight Through Life: An Aviator's Memoir 2013
J. F. Langer From the Spitfire Cockpit to the Cabinet Office: The Memoirs of Air Commodore J F 'Johnny' Langer 2016
G. F. Schreader Hognose Silent Warrior: The USAF's Airborne Intelligence War in the Final Air Campaigns of Vietnam 2017
Carl G. Schneider Jet Pioneer: A Fighter Pilot's Memoir 2017
Harold Brown Keep Your Airspeed Up: The Story of a Tuskegee Airman 2017
Norman Kleiss Never Call Me a Hero: A Legendary American Dive-Bomber Pilot Remembers the Battle of Midway[ad] 2017
D. D. Smith Above Average: Naval Aviation the Hard Way 2018
Steve Ladd From F-4 Phantom to A-10 Warthog: Memoirs of a Cold War Fighter Pilot 2020
Van H. Slayden Normandy to Nazi Surrender: Firsthand Account of a P-47 Thunderbolt Pilot[ae][af] 2020
Richard E. Miralles War and Fire: From Fighting in World War II to Fighting California Wild Fires 2020
Christopher Coville Fighter Pilot: From Cold War Jets to Spitfires 2021
Denis Elliott From Orphan to High-Flyer[ag] 2021
Robert J. Gilliland Speed: The Life of a Test Pilot and Birth of an American Icon 2021
Ed Cobleigh And I Lived to Tell the Tales: The Life of a Fighter Pilot 2022

References

Footnotes

  1. ↑ This would later be re-edited and published in English as Stuka Pilot.
  2. ↑ Coauthored. There are significant questions regarding the authenticity of the book due to changes by the coauthor.
  3. ↑ Coauthored.
  4. ↑ The author wrote three books during his lifetime: The Designer's Tales in 1950, a second book in 1964, and The Purpose of Life in 1967. The books vary in content, most distinctly being rewritten in regards to the changing political situation in the Soviet Union.[1] The first English language book, Notes of an Aircraft Designer was published in 1960.[2] A second English language book, corresponding with the third Russian language book and titled The Aim of a Lifetime, was published in 1972.[3]
  5. ↑ Coauthored.
  6. ↑ Published in English as On Wings of War: My Life as a Pilot Adventurer.
  7. ↑ The author wrote two additional books: The Flight of the Mew Gull in 1980 and Wings Across the Great Divide: Postwar Flying in Africa in the 1940s in 2004. They cover his prewar and postwar life, respectively.
  8. ↑ Coauthored.
  9. ↑ Coauthored.
  10. ↑ Coauthored.
  11. ↑ Coauthored.
  12. ↑ An earlier memoir was published as The Stars at Noon.
  13. ↑ An earlier memoir was published as God is My Co-Pilot.
  14. ↑ Coauthored.
  15. ↑ Coauthored.
  16. ↑ Coauthored.
  17. ↑ Coauthored.
  18. ↑ Coauthored.
  19. ↑ Coauthored.
  20. ↑ Coauthored.
  21. ↑ Coauthored.
  22. ↑ Coauthored.
  23. ↑ Coauthored.
  24. ↑ Coauthored.
  25. ↑ Coauthored.
  26. ↑ This may be a compilation of various articles published in the magazine Flight Journal.[4][5]
  27. ↑ Coauthored.
  28. ↑ Coauthored.
  29. ↑ Published posthumously.
  30. ↑ Coauthored.
  31. ↑ Coauthored.
  32. ↑ Published posthumously.
  33. ↑ Coauthored.

Notes

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