Lightning In The Sky - The Story Of Jimmy Doolittle

LIGHTNING The Story of Jimmy Doolittle By CARL MANN ROBERT M. McBRIDE COMPANY NEW YORK 3 LIGHTNING IN THE SKY COPYRIGHT, 1943, BY ROBERT M. MC BRIDE COMPANY PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA FIRST EDITION DEDICATED to those who proudly rise with silver wings to keep bright the golden rays of freedom and to their comrades who have paid the supreme sacrifice in war-torn skies that that same freedom shall not perish. Contents 1. FRANK DOOLHTLE, ALASKA PROSPECTOR 9 2. JEMMY DOOLITTLE GOES TO NOME 18 3. HIGH SCHOOL ATHLETE 25 4. AMATEUR BANTAMWEIGHT CHAMPION 31 5. AIR CADET IN WORLD WAR I 36 6. DAREDEVIL SECOND LIEUTENANT 47 7. AERIAL PARADE, 1918 53 8. HERE AND THERE AND CROSS-COUNTRY 63 9. COAST TO COAST 71 10. JIMMY DOOLITTLE, DOCTOR OF AERONAUTICS 82 11. ACROBATICS IN THE SKY, AND THE Ant CORPS ON THE CARPET 90 12. THE PULITZER TROPHY 102 13. THE SCHNEIDER CUP RACE 109 14. JIMMY, THE GOOD NEIGHBOR 121 15. THE OUTSIDE LOOP 138 16. SECOND SOUTH AMERICAN JUNKET 146 17. WINGS BROKE THROWN Our 153 18. FLYING OVER EUROPE 166 19. WINNING THE BENDIX TROPHY RACE 177 20. FOLLOWING GEORGE WASHINGTON IN THE Ant 189 21. THE HUMAN HURRICANE 199 22. THE HORIZON WIDENS 211 23. NEW HONORS 223 24. THE RAID ON TOKYO 236 25. ANY PLACE HE WANTS TO LEAD Us 249 7 CHAPTER 1 Frank Doolittle, Alaska Prospector FOR A QUARTER of a century a brilliant American flyer has been blazing a dazzling path through the skies. His courage and flying skill are the spectacular sides of his stalwart character. He has pioneered the aeronautical sciences. Born the son of California pioneers, nurtured as a youth in the Alaskan Klon dike, educated in the primary and grade schools of Nome and later in the high schools ofCalifornia, at Los Angeles Junior College and the University of California, Jimmy Doolittle dropped a budding career as a lightning-fisted prizefighter to win his wings as a cadet at the start of World War I. James Harold Doolittles career stands out in bold relief as a striking symbol of a red-blooded, free, democratic America a story of youth success achievement heroism and unbridled cour age and patriotism. When a gallant crew of American flyers roared over the coast of Japan that sun-drenched day of April 18, 1942, to wreak havoc and destruction on the treacherous Japanese war lords and their humming war plants, few Americans, except those who personally knew him, guessed that Jimmy Doolittle was the man in command. Still fewer Americans knew the real story of this courageous flyer a man who was then already the holder of so many daring firsts in records of world aviation that he probably could not name them himself now without consulting the book. Neither did many Americans know that this modest hero and flyer held the degrees of 9 IO LIGHTNING IN THE SKY Master of Science and Doctor of Science from the Massachu setts Institute of Technology. Vaguely familiar may have been the name of Doolittle to many who had skctchily followed the development of avia tion. There were those who remembered Jimmy Doolittle as the first aviator to fly from the Atlantic coast to the Pacific in less than one day, back in September, 1922. Still others re called after that historic mission to Tokyo that Jimmy was the same flyer who astounded the citizens of the United States with his amazing aerial dash from coast to coast again in 1932 to break his old record of 1922, crossing the continent in less thanhalf a day an event that marked a new era. It was not surprising that the Congressional Medal of Honor should be handed to Doolittle by President Roosevelt on his return from the Tokyo mission, for that was one of the few remaining honors left for him to earn. Thirteen years earlier he had been awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross with the Oak Leaf Cluster. Today every commercial airliner and military plane that roars into the air wearing the American emblem is guided by instruments pioneered by Jimmy Doolittle...