"American Classics of the Air"

Model Airplane News, Jun 2001 by Yarrish, Gerry

ZENITH BOOKS

"American Classics of the Air"

Picture perfect

Written by Geoff Jones and Chuck Stewart "Amercan Classics of the Air" is a wonderful, all-color book of commercial and private airplanes from the 1920s to the 1960s. It has 112 pages and 205 vivid pictures of beautiful and historically significant aircraft. Combining air-to-air, static ground and interior and exterior close-up detail photographs, At richly documents the technological progress of civil aviation over a 50-year span. In all, 39 airplanes are illustrated, along with brief descriptions of each aircraft type.

A two-page appendix lists information on more than 75 antique and classic aircraft clubs and oroanizations very helpful source for anyone who's researching a scale model airplane. From the Travel Air 4000 and the Fairchild (Kreider-Reisner) KR.21, the Ryan STA, Stinson Reliant and the Ercoupe 415E to the Beechcraft Model 35 Bonanza and the Grumman G-37 Mallard, many of the really popular airplanes are shown. I was especially pleased to find several photographs of the little-known General Aircraft G1-80 Skyfarer. The softbound book costs $24.95 and is available from Zenith Books.

Whether you're looking for a nice coffee-table book or you just enjoy looking at pretty pictures of classic airplanes, this book will make a great addition to your aviation reference library. I highly recommend it.

Zenith Books, MBI Publishing Co., 729 Prospect Ave., P.O. Box 1, Osceola, WI 54020-0001; (800) 826-6600; www.motorbooks.com.