The Flight

Written by one of the most decorated pilots in Air Force history, a gripping and unique ?in-the-cockpit? account of Charles Lindbergh's death-defying nonstop flight across the Atlantic Ocean in The Spirit of St. Louis?an achievement that brought the world to a halt in May 1927 and made Lindbergh the most celebrated man of his timeOn the rainy morning of May 20, 1927, a little-known American pilot named Charles A. Lindbergh climbed into his single-engine monoplane, The Spirit of St. Louis, and prepared to take off from a small airfield on Long Island, New York. Ahead of him lay a 3,600-mile solo journey as he sought to become the first to fly nonstop across the Atlantic Ocean. Only 500 people showed up to see him off. Thirty-three and a half hours later, a crowd of more than 100,000 mobbed Spirit as the audacious young American touched down in Paris and achieved the seemingly impossible. Overnight, as he navigated by the stars across the featureless ocean, news of his attempt had circled the globe, making him an international celebrity by the time he reached Europe. The Flight, from acclaimed aviation historian Dan Hampton, is a long-overdue, flyer's-eye narrative of Lindbergh's legendary journey.