Vintage Airliners: A Book Signing at the Sherman Historical Society Old Store Museum & Gift Shop

Online, October 16, 2010 (Newswire.com) - Vintage Airliners: A Collection of Vintage Photographs begins telling the story of how the airline industry began, its initial challenges to the railroad industry and how in 1951 airliners carried more passengers than the railroad for the first time. The 114 page, 8 ½ x 11 paperback book that hosts an impressive collection of black and white photographs and historical aviation information. "Seeing some of the old TWA, Eastern, Mohawk, and American airliners was really a treat. When did the airlines overtake railroads as the most common way to travel? How many people remember sleeping berths on an airplane? Did you know that at one time you needed to coordinate a railroad seat with your airline seat to travel cross country? It's hard to imagine that so much aviation history could be packaged into such an interesting picture book." stated Gloria Thorne, Curator at The Sherman Historical Society.

Commercial aviation history unfolds while you turn the pages of Vintage Airliners . During the journey the photographs will help you step back to the days when airlines could not fly at night, when Ford Motors built the most common airliner, and when passengers flew in Fokker, Curtiss Condor, Boeing 247 and the Douglas DC-1 and DC-3. You will see airliners and many interiors before and after WWII including the Connie or Constellation, the Stratocruiser and the family of DC-4 and DC-6 airliners and some airliners that did not enter into production.

Turing its pages you will read short stories about individual airliners, examples include; an Hawaiian Airlines DC-3 airliner attacked at Pearl Harbor December 7, 1941; a Swedish Air Lines DC-4 named Norian, which was the first foreign aircraft to fly over New York City after WWII or Princess Elizabeth christening the first British pressurized airliner.

All of the major airlines are included; American, Delta, Eastern, National Airlines, Northwest, Pan American, TWA, and United Airlines. Many regional carriers are pictured highlighting; Long Island Airlines, Los Angeles Airways, Trans-Texas, West Coast Airlines, Mohawk, Hawaiian Airlines and Wein Alaska Airlines. International carriers are represented too; KLM, Air France, Alitalia, Australia National Airways, British Overseas Airways, Qantas, Sebena and Colonial Airlines to name a few.

Readers will see the first radar gear installed at major airports, see gas fired fog reduction systems at Los Angeles Airport, landing lights being introduced to Newark and Idlewild/New York International (JFK) Airport and see early Air Traffic Control in Atlanta. The era ended with the introduction the Comet and Boeing 707 prototype which ushered in the jet age that forever changed commercial air travel.

The 114 page 8 ½ x 11 paperback book hosts an impressive collection of black and white photographs and historical aviation information. Additional book signings are scheduled in Chicago, IL on December 4th and other locations are pending final dates in several states during the holidays. Vintage Airliners is also featured in the mid-November Sacramento, California Library/California School Library Association book event.

About the author - John is a skilled aviation historian focused on mid twentieth-century general aviation, military aircraft and the people that made them possible. As a member of AOPA (Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association), EAA (Experimental Aircraft Association) and an honorary member of the Danbury, Connecticut WWII Lost Squadron Veterans organization, his stories are recognized for their excellence in accuracy and authenticity. Other books include Portals into the Sky, a collection of 100 different vintage cockpit photographs and Cessna Sensations, a pictorial history of Cessna aircraft from the 1930s until 1964.