A Brief History On December 21, 1990, one of the greatest contributors to American military technology and perhaps the greatest airplane designer of all time passed away quietly in Burbank, California at the age of 80. Born in a small Michigan town to poor Swedish parents, Clarence L. “Kelly” Johnson was an enthusiastic student and showed a glimpse of the future when he designed his first airplane at the age of 13! Digging Deeper Education at Flint Junior College and the University of Michigan followed, where he was awarded a Master’s degree in Aeronautical Engineering. At Michigan Johnson realized a…
Browsing: December
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A Brief History On December 20, 1957, one of the most important flights in the history of passenger airlines took place when the Boeing 707 jetliner made its first flight. Although not the first jetliner to carry passengers, the 707 was the first successful commercial passenger jet, and remains in limited service today. Digging Deeper Developed from the Boeing prototype jetliner 367-80, circa 1954, the 707 also traces its lineage to the great Boeing bombers of the post-World War II era, the B-47 and the B-52. Like those bombers, the 707 has a relatively narrow fuselage and carries its 4…
A Brief History On December 19, 2016, another part of our democratic process will take place when the 538 electors of the Electoral College vote in the official US Presidential election of 2016. All those millions of individual votes could either be confirmed or thrown out with the trash, depending on how the electors vote. Digging Deeper With a mandatory majority of 270 votes needed to be elected President, if no candidate gets that many electors to vote for him/her the vote would be remanded to the House of Representatives, who would then choose our next president. Who are these…
A Brief History On December 19,1961, the armed forces of India completed Operation Vijay, a land, sea and air assault against the Portuguese enclaves on Indian soil in the Goa region. The mini-war only lasted 2 days, but it ended 451 years of Portuguese colonialism in India. Digging Deeper Portugal had grabbed a piece of India during the age of exploration when European colonial powers were conducting land grabs all over the world. Portugal had established bases on the Indian sub-continent in the area of Goa and nearby regions, a modest holding by colonial standards, and Goa today is India’s…
A Brief History On December 18, 1982, arguably the greatest combat pilot in German military history died of a stroke in Rosenheim, Bavaria, West Germany. Hans-Ulrich Rudel is credited with shooting down only 9 enemy airplanes, and yet eclipses such German legendary aces as Baron Manfred von Richthofen (80 aerial kills, #1 during World War II) and Erich Hartman, history’s all-time leading ace with 353 air to air kills without ever being shot down or forced to land by enemy airplanes (all during World War II). Digging Deeper Rudel performed his heroics mainly at the stick of the JU-87 Stuka…