300 biplanes, triplanes and seaplanes featured, each one illustrated by a full-color artwork. Describes the most important and exciting Biplanes, triplanes and seaplanes from around the world. Includes the famous aircraft of World War I, including planes flown by the Red Baron and Eddie Rickenbacker.

From the dawn of aviation until the end of World War II--the "golden age" of flight--these 300 influential multi-wing aircraft ruled the skies. Among the classics of the pioneering years and beyond: the Sopwith Camel, the Red Baron's Fokker Triplane, the Fairey Swordfish, and the Consolidated Catalina, as well as popular civil aircraft like the Tiger Moth and Supermarine S.5.

Biplanes and seaplanes dominated early aviation. The flying surfaces on biplanes added strength to the structure and provided extra lift to compensate for comparatively small engines, while seaplanes were favored for the unlimited space water provided for long take-off runs. This is an extensive guide to more than 120 biplanes, triplanes, and seaplanes, from early designs such as the Wright Flyer to jet flying boats and timeless classics like the Tiger Moth and the Curtiss JN-4 "Jenny." 600 color and archival black-and-white photographs are featured in this extraordinary book.

The torpedo-bomber was a very short-lived weapon system, operational for scarcely half a century from just prior WWI to the 1960s. Yet during its brief existence it transformed naval warfare, extending the ship-killing range of ships and coastal defences to hundreds of miles. The Royal Navy and Fleet Air Arm led the way, recording the first sinking of a ship by aerial torpedo in August 1915 but all major navies eagerly developed their own torpedo bomber forces. The torpedo-bomber reached its zenith in WWII, particularly from 1940-42, with notable successes at the Battle of Taranto, the sinking of the Bismarck and Pearl Harbor. It was the weapon of choice for both the US and Japanese in the big Pacific battles such as Midway. In the latter stages of the war, increasingly effective anti-aircraft fire and interceptor aircraft started to render it obsolete, a process completed post-war by long-range anti-ship missiles. Jean-Denis Lepage traces the development of torpedo bombers worldwide, describing their tactics, operational history and the aircraft themselves, including such well-loved types as the Swordfish, Beaufighter and Avenger. Over 300 aircraft are beautifully illustrated.

Modern is a word much used, but hard to pin down. In Inventing Modern, John H. Lienhard uses that word to capture the furious rush of newness in the first half of 20th-century America. An unexpected world emerges from under the more familiar Modern. Beyond the airplanes, radios, art deco, skyscrapers, Fritz Lang's Metropolis, Buck Rogers, the culture of the open road--Burma Shave, Kerouac, and White Castles--lie driving forces that set this account of Modern apart. One force, says Lienhard, was a new concept of boyhood--the risk-taking, hands-on savage inventor. Driven by an admiration of recklessness, America developed its technological empire with stunning speed. Bringing the airplane to fruition in so short a time, for example, were people such as Katherine Stinson, Lincoln Beachey, Amelia Earhart, and Charles Lindbergh. The rediscovery of mystery powerfully drove Modern as well. X-Rays, quantum mechanics, and relativity theory had followed electricity and radium. Here we read how, with reality seemingly altered, hope seemed limitless. Lienhard blends these forces with his childhood in the brave new world. The result is perceptive, engaging, and filled with surprise. Whether he talks about Alexander Calder (an engineer whose sculptures were exercises in materials science) or that wacky paean to flight, Flying Down to Rio, unexpected detail emerges from every tile of this large mosaic. Inventing Modern is a personal book that displays, rather than defines, an age that ended before most of us were born. It is an engineer's homage to a time before the bomb and our terrible loss of confidence--a time that might yet rise again out of its own postmodern ashes.