| Nonfiction
Website Bibliography: This list of books is selective rather
than all-inclusive. I have either read these books or they have
been recommended to me as being significant writings in the
field of airship history.
Roald Amundsen and Lincoln Ellsworth: First Crossing:
Polar Sea by Airship 1926
George H. Doran Company - 1927
Thomas L. Blakemore & W. Watters Pagon: Pressure
Airships
NY - Ronald Press - 1927
Non-rigids and semi-rigids and the math behind building them
Peter W. Brooks: Zeppelin: Rigid Airships, 1893-1940
Washington, DC - Smithsonian
Institution Press - 1992 - ISBN: 1560982284
Extremely well researched. Lists detail on EVERY Zeppelin built
in its covered period.
Carl Bruer: With the Zeppelin to South America: Diary
of the Round Trip 1931
Frost Company - 2001
Bronze medal winner, APS Literature Exhibition, Atlantic City,
NJ. English and German.
Barry Countryman: R100 in Canada
Erin, Ontario - Boston Mills Press - 1982 - ISBN: 0919822363
Tim Coates: R101: The Airship Disaster, 1930
The Stationery Office - 2001 -- ISBN: 0117024074
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Wilbur Cross: Disaster
at the Pole
NY - Lyons Press
- 2000 - ISBN: 1585740497
The Tragedy of the Airship Italia and the 1928 Nobile
Expedition to the North Pole. Revised edition of "Ghost
Ship of the Pole".
Wilbur Cross: Zeppelins of World War 1
NY - Paragon - 1991 |
Guillaume De Syon: Zeppelin!: Germany and the Airship,
1900-1939
Baltimore - Johns Hopkins University Press - 2002 - ISBN:
0801867347
C. Dean [editor]: Housing the Airship
London - Architectural Association - 1989 - ISBN 870890-11-6
[Dictionary]: Dictionary of American Naval
Fighting Ships
Washington, DC - Naval History Div., Dept of the Navy -
1991
Capsule summaries of all the USN's rigid airships except ZR-2.
Ludwig Dürr: Die grossen Zeppeline: die Geschichte
des Luftschiffbaus
Düsseldorf - VDI Verlag - ISBN: ISBN: 3-18-400687-5
This book is hard to find in the US as it is a German publication
printed in German, but you may find it in university libraries
or by ordering it through a bookstore.
Hugo Eckener [with H Leigh Farnell]: Count
Zeppelin: The Man and His Work
London - Massie Pub. Co., Ltd - 1938
Hugo Eckener: Im Zeppelin uber Lander und Meere
Flensburg - Verlagshaus Christian Wolff - 1949
It's books like these that make you want to learn German. Written
by the man chosen by Count Zeppelin to join him in developing
and flying the Zeppelin airships.
Hugo Eckener: My Zeppelins
London - Putnam - 1958
Translated from the German By Douglas Robinson. With a technical
paper by Knut Eckener. Authoratative.
Thor Goote: Peter Strasser, der F.d.L., der Führer
der Luftschiffe
Berlin - Deutsche Buch-Gemeinschaft - 1938
Biography of the head of the German Naval airships of World
War I.
Davide Giudici: The Tragedy of the Italia: With the
Rescuers to the Red Tent
New York - D. Appleton and Co. - 1929
Margaret Goldsmith: Zeppelin: A Biography
New York - William Morrow & Co - 1931
Guy Hartcup: Achievement of the Airship: a history
of the development of rigid, semi-rigid, and non-rigid airships
Newton Abbot ; North Pomfret, Vt. - David & Charles - 1974
- ISBN: 0715365517
Robin Higham: The British Rigid Airship, 1908-1913
London - G.T. Foulis - 1962
Tom Jamison: Icarus over the Humber: The Last Flight
of Airship R.38 / ZR-2
Hull [England] - Lampada Press - 1994 - ISBN: 1-873811-03-9
"... an authorative account of the R.38 / ZR-2 tragedy ..."
R.D. Layman: Naval
Aviation in the First World War
Annapolis - Naval Institute
Press - 1996 - ISBN: 1557506175
London - Chatham Publishing - 1996
(see also: Dirigibles,
Airships, and Blimps)
Ernst Lehmann: Auf Luftpatroulle und Weltfahrt
Peter G. Masefield: To Ride the Storm - The Story
of Airship R101
London - Kimber - 1982
Henry Cord Meyer: Airshipmen, Businessmen, &
Politics, 1890-1940
Washington, DC - Smithsonian
Institution Press - 1991 - ISBN: 1560980311
Quite simply, there is information here that you just won't
find anywhere else in one place. Formidible researched. Excellent.
A new book is coming out in the next few weeks and I'm very
happy to report
that it contains the detailed memoirs of US Navy LTA pilot
Commander Lundi
Moore (who turns 78 on Tuesday) as well as Luftschiff-Kapitan
Hans von Schiller
(1891-1976) who served aboard Zeppelins of the Imperial German
Navy in the First
World War, as well as an an officer aboard the delivery of
LZ126 (ZR3 USS LOS
ANGELES) and command of the LZ127 GRAF ZEPPELIN and LZ130 GRAF
ZEPPELIN II.
The book, titled AIRSHIP EXPERIENCES, also includes stories
from LCdr. R.H.
"Ducky" Ward (1895-1981) , who served in USN LTA
from the 1920's thru World War
II, Harmon Trophy Winner Commander Charlie Mills (1922-2000)
and the story of
"The LTA Man's Best Friend BLACK DOG. (dog born approx
1942, buried @ NAS
GLYNCO 1955?)"
Book will be available thru Atlantis Publications, PO Box 700
Edgewater, FL
as well as THE LIGHTER THAN AIR SOCIETY, NAVY LAKEHURST HISTORICAL
SOCIETY and
HISTORIC AVIATION (catalogue.)
This should be a "keeper" for the library of every
serious LTA
historian/plain old Aviation Enthusiast. A few photos
below from text include Lundi Moore
(8th from right) after bringing in ZPG2 from record-breaking
95.5 hour "on
station" operational flight(1960) and also Captain Hans
von Schiller (on the left)
with Captain Max Pruss on the bridge of the LZ127 GRAF ZEPPELIN
during one of
the ship's 1934 South American flights (they had flown together
since the
First World War, when Schiller was a First Officer and Pruss
was an Elevatorman
aboard German Navy L6,L11,L30,L25,(L57),L54,(L72)and L61...note
on parenthesis,
they were assigned to L57 and L72 but never flew the ships
and the L61 duty
came in 1919 for a post-war "last ditch" movie filming
stint whereby the Naval
Airship Division inflated its best condition...or least worst
condition...Zeppelin for a few days' movie work.
Rick Zitarosa
J.E. Morpurgo: Barnes Wallis - A Biography
[Harlow] - Longman - 1972 - ISBN: 0582103606
New York - St. Martin's Press - 1972
Very well researched biography about the designer of R100.
Umberto Nobile [translated by Frances Fleetwood]:
My Five Years with Soviet Airships
Akron, OH - Lighter-Than-Air Society - 1987 - LCCN: 88-153931
Lee Payne: Lighter Than Air: an illustrated history
of the airship
Revised edition: NY - Orion Books - 1991- ISBN: 0517574764
One of the finest introductions to LTA history. Very well researched,
nicely illustrated, informative bibliography.
Erich Rackwitz: Reisen und Abenteuer im Zeppelin
Neuenhagen at Berlin --Verlag Sport und Technik
License Nr.545/9/56; MDI of the DDR (East Germany) Nr.4342
The experiences of Dr.Hugo Eckner. It is written in lifestyle
with nice pictures. -- Axel Muehring
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Douglas Hill Robinson: Giants
in the Sky: A History of the Rigid Airship
3rd edition: Seattle - University of Washington Press
- 1979 - ISBN: 0295952490
Douglas Hill Robinson [with Harold G. Dick]:
The Golden Age of the Great Passenger Airships Graf
Zeppelin and Hindenburg
Washington, D.C. - Smithsonian
Institution Press - 1985
Eyewitness account written by the Goodyear representative
in Friedshafen.
Douglas Hill Robinson [with Charles L. Keller]:
Up Ship: U.S. Navy Rigid Airships 1919-1935
Annapolis, MD - Naval Institute Press - 1982
Detailed book about the US Navy's involvement with airships.
Douglas Hill Robinson: The
Zeppelin in Combat: A History of the German Naval Airship
Division, 1912-1918
2nd edition: Atglen, PA - Schiffer Military/Aviation
History - 1994 - ISBN: 088740510X
Authoratative. Definitive. Thorough. |
Raymond L. Rimel: The Airship VC: The Life of Captain
William Leefe Robinson
Bourne End - Aston Publications - 1989
- ISBN: 0946627533
The story of the Royal Flying Corps pilot that was awarded the
VC for shooting down the first airship (L21) over London on
the night of 2/3 September 1916.
Raymond L. Rimel: Zeppelin: A Battle for Air Supremacy
in World War I
London - Conway Maritime Press - 1984
- ISBN: 0851772390
James R. Shock: American Airship Bases & Facilities
Edgewater, FL - Atlantis Productions - 1996 - ISBN: 0-9649480-3-6
James R. Shock: U.S. Navy Pressure Airships: 1915-1962:
A History of U.S. Navy Airships
(Non- rigid, Semi-rigid and Metalclad) by Individual
Airships
New Smyrna Beach, FL - M&T Printers - 1994 - ISBN: 0963974335
Hundreds of photos are all half-toned. It seems to containtons
of info and diagrams about handling rigid airships, with closeup
details on everything from the ZRS stern beam to the Ford high
mast, every hangar ever built by anybody, the little- known
Army airship program, Navy timber hangars and airships even
in France during WWII, maps of locations by era, etc. etc. It's
pretty heavy at 240 pages but it can be mailed book rate. If
you tell him who to make it out to, the author will authograph
and mail you a copy for $35. Tell him I sent you. His Address
is:
- James Shock
- 3208 Red Brick Ct.
- Mainville, Ohio 45039-9528
Nevil Shute: Slide Rule: The Autobiography of an
Engineer.
New York - Morrow - 1954 - LCCN: 54-7100
Written by one of the members of the R100 design team with details
about its construction and flights. And yes, he subsequently
became a noted author.
Richard K.Smith: The Airships Akron & Macon:
Flying Aircraft Carriers of the United States Navy
Annapolis - Naval Institute
Press - 1965 - ISBN: 0870210653
The definitive work. The single best source concerning these
two dirigibles.
Christopher Sprigg: The Airship: Its Design, History,
Operation and Future
London - S. Low, Marston & Co., Ltd. - [1931]
(2001)
"I've read Sprigg's account a few years ago. Still learning
about airships then, I found it a very complete and instructive
book. It gives good explanations of the physics and the technology
of LTA. It's written about 1931, just after the demise of the
large British rigid program. It contains good pictures and a
list of the fate of all the Zeppelins produced up to that year."
Thanks to from Paul.vDaalen@ivw.nl
John Toland: Ships in the Sky
New York - Holt - 1957
Also published as Giants in the Sky. Vivid. Gripping.
Makes history come alive.
And yes, this is the same historian who wrote those books about
WWII.
J. Gordon Vaeth: Blimps and U-Boats: U.S. Navy airships
in the battle of the Atlantic
Annapolis, MD - Naval Institue
Press - 1992 - ISBN: 1557508763
Navy blimps in Word War
J. Gordon Vaeth: Graf Zeppelin: The Adventures of
an Aerial Globetrotter
New York - Harper - 1958 - LCCN: 58-6164
A.F. de Molyns Ventry and Eugène M Kolesnik: Jane's
Pocket Book of Airship Development
London - Macdonald and Jane's - 1976 - ISBN: 0356046559
Same as the one below. Slightly different titles.
A.F. de Molyns Ventry and Eugène M Kolesnik: Jane's
Pocket Book of Airships
New York - Collier Books - 1977 - ISBN: 0020803303
THE pocket guide to airships up to the 1970s.
A.F. de Molyns Ventry and Eugène M Kolesnik: R-36:
Airship Saga
Dorset-Blandford Press-1980
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Nick Le Neve Walmsley: R101:
A Pictorial History
Stroud (England) - Sutton Publishing - 2000 - ISBN:
0750925027
"The book tells the story in detail of the life of not
only the ship, but the people behind the design and construction
of the ship." |
fyi:
Smithsonian Institution Press
Marketing Department
470 L'Enfant Plaza
Washington, D.C. 20560
For young readers
Heck, adults will love these as well. They
are gems. Peter Hood: When Zeppelins flew
NY - Time-Life Books - 1969
Mareille Majoor and Ken Marschall: Inside
the Hindenburg
NY - Time Warner - 1999 - ISBN: 0316123862
Shelly Tanaka: Disaster of the Hindenburg: the Last
Flight of the Greatest Airship Ever Built
NY - Scholastic/Madison Press - 1993 -
ISBN: 0590457500 |
