Fighting the Flying Circus

by Eddie V. Rickenbacker

Book Overview

Capt. Rickenbacker was a high-flying eagle from the time he burst upon the nat. scene as a record-setting race car driver in 1914 until his death in 1973. This book originally published in 1919, is unquestionably the best of all the Amer. memoirs of air combat in WW1. As a member of the 94th Pursuit Squadron, he evolved his own view of the war as a distasteful duty to be done as quickly and efficiently as possible. In his memoir he displays a gift...

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0809479540
• ISBN13: 9780809479542
• Release Date: January 1989
• Publisher: Time Life Medical
• Length: 371 Pages
• Weight: 1.45 lbs.

Customer Reviews

loved it as a kid, even better as an adult

Rickenbacker's adventures, told in Rickenbacker's own words. This story is the definitive acount of WWI air combat. The only books that come close are by British pilot Arch Whitehouse, but those lack the descriptions and heart of Eddie Rickenbacker's "Fighting the Flying Circus". One can almost smell the dirt and grass from the runways and see the tracer fire from the machine guns. Throughout we see the character of a simple midwestern man who became the Ace of Aces in American flying history. The individual flying episodes are memorable such as the time he refused to let an (allied) French Nieuport get behind him after he became lost on patrol. He later found out that a German pilot in a captured Neiuport was slipping across the lines to wreck havoc on the Allies. Or the time an anti-aircraft shell lodged in his engine yet failed to detonate. The story is vivid and thrilling until the end, even though we all know the larger outcome.

Excellent

I have a first edition, signed and frame copy of this book and need clarity on your 1995 publishing date. Can I assume this is a first, second or whatever printing. Thanks

Looks like a good book....

I have not read this book, but I have an original autographed copyright 1919, and would like to find out the value of the book. Does anyone know how I can do this??

The classic account of WWI aerial combat

Eddie Rickenbacker was, of course, the top-scoring American ace of the First World War, shooting down 26 enemy aircraft. This hard-to-find book is _the_ classic account of aerial combat in World War One. It fairly breathes the cocky, pugnacious spirit of the successful combat aviator, and is, in itself, a remarkable survival story. Rickenbacker was a squadron leader of note as well as a formidable single-combat warrior, and his observations on command are applicable today. Like other great aviators who racked up impressive victories but survived, Rickenbacker was aggressive and confident but not rash. He took pains to plan his missions and to assure their success, attending to the smallest details himself (even to inspecting the individual rounds loaded for his SPAD's machine guns). Rickenbacker is a skillful narrator, and his precise description of the lethal ballet of aerial combat is readable and comprehensible for the flyer and non-flyer alike. Rickenbacker had the reputation of being overbearing at times, but this is not communicated in his writing. Indeed, one of the most memorable passages in this book describes his repeated but ultimately unsuccessful attempts to bring down a particular German observation plane. This is a wonderful book that deserves to be read. Any reader with an interest in flying, but especially combat flying, can do no better than to pick up this excellent work.