Navigating the C-124 Globemaster - by Billy D Higgins (Paperback)

About the Book

""The C-124 Globemaster-a U.S. military heavy-lift transport in service 1950 through 1974-barreling down a runway was an awesome sight. The aircraft's four 3800 hp piston engines (the largest ever mass-produced), mounted on its 174-foot wingspan, could carry a 69,000-pound payload of tanks, artillery or other cargo, or 200 fully equipped troops, at more than 300 mph. The flight crew, perched three stories above the landing gears in an unpressurized cockpit, relied, like Magellan, on celestial fixes to navigate over oceans. With a world-wide mission delivering troops and materials to such destinations as the Congo, Vietnam, Thule, Greenland and Antarctica, the Globemaster lived up to its name and was foundational to what Time magazine publisher Henry Luce termed the "American Century." Drawing on coast-to-coast visits to archives, Air Force bases, libraries and accident sites, and his own recollections as a navigator, the author details Cold War confrontations and consequent strategies that emerged after Douglas Aircraft Company delivered the first C-124A to the Military Air Transport Service in 1949."-Provided by publisher."--

Book Synopsis

The C-124 Globemaster--a U.S. military heavy-lift transport in service 1950 through 1974--barreling down a runway was an awesome sight. The aircraft's four 3800 hp piston engines (the largest ever mass-produced), mounted on its 174-foot wingspan, could carry a 69,000-pound payload of tanks, artillery or other cargo, or 200 fully equipped troops, at more than 300 mph.

The flight crew, perched three stories above the landing gears in an unpressurized cockpit, relied, like Magellan, on celestial fixes to navigate over oceans. With a world-wide mission delivering troops and materials to such destinations as the Congo, Vietnam, Thule, Greenland and Antarctica, the Globemaster lived up to its name and was foundational to what Time magazine publisher Henry Luce termed the "American Century."

Drawing on archives, Air Force bases, libraries and accident sites, and his own recollections as a navigator, the author details Cold War confrontations and consequent strategies that emerged after Douglas Aircraft Company delivered the first C-124A to the Military Air Transport Service in 1949.

Review Quotes

"Navigating the C-124 Globemaster is a serious and important work, equal parts aviation/navigation history and old-fashioned travelogue. The writing gurus are always talking about the textural imperative of storytelling...sights, sounds, smells, tastes. Well, mission accomplished, it's all there. Reading this work, I felt like I was in that bubble and cockpit with Lt. Higgins and crew, out in the netherworld of the Pacific or reversing engines in a typhoon of dust on a makeshift runway at Pleiku, Vietnam. An adventure in aviation not to be missed."-Phil Karber, two-time Lowell Thomas medalist and author of Postmarks from a Political Traveler; Fear and Faith in Paradise: Exploring Conflict and Religion in the Middle East and The Indochina Chronicles: Travels in Laos, Cambodia and Vietnam

About the Author

Billy D. Higgins teaches history at the University of Arkansas-Fort Smith.