
John Lancaster: The Great Air Race
01/05/23 • 50 min
In 1919, the forerunner to the United States Air Force, the Air Service, staged an audacious transcontinental air race. While flying coast to coast had never really been done before, the head of the Training and Operations Group, Brigadier-General Billy Mitchell. Decided that making it a round-trip race would be even better than just going one way. So in October 1919, using war surplus aircraft, including British and German single-seat Scouts, the great air race began.
Former Washington Post Foreign Correspondent and pilot John Lancaster has retraced the roots of men like Tooey Spaatz and the 'Flying Parson', Belvin Maynard, back and forth across the United States and his new book. The Great Air Race.
To learn more and John, visit his website at: https://www.johnlancasterauthor.com/
Follow John on Twitter at: https://twitter.com/JohnKLancaster
Follow John on Facebook at: https://www.facebook.com/JohnLancasterAuthor/
Check out all our social media channels at: https://www.damcasterspod.com
Join the fun on Patreon! Join from just £3+VAT a month to get ad-free episodes, chat with Matt and grab some merch. Check out the link below for more info.
The Damcasters © 2022 by Matt Bone is licensed under Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International
★ Support this podcast on Patreon ★Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
In 1919, the forerunner to the United States Air Force, the Air Service, staged an audacious transcontinental air race. While flying coast to coast had never really been done before, the head of the Training and Operations Group, Brigadier-General Billy Mitchell. Decided that making it a round-trip race would be even better than just going one way. So in October 1919, using war surplus aircraft, including British and German single-seat Scouts, the great air race began.
Former Washington Post Foreign Correspondent and pilot John Lancaster has retraced the roots of men like Tooey Spaatz and the 'Flying Parson', Belvin Maynard, back and forth across the United States and his new book. The Great Air Race.
To learn more and John, visit his website at: https://www.johnlancasterauthor.com/
Follow John on Twitter at: https://twitter.com/JohnKLancaster
Follow John on Facebook at: https://www.facebook.com/JohnLancasterAuthor/
Check out all our social media channels at: https://www.damcasterspod.com
Join the fun on Patreon! Join from just £3+VAT a month to get ad-free episodes, chat with Matt and grab some merch. Check out the link below for more info.
The Damcasters © 2022 by Matt Bone is licensed under Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International
★ Support this podcast on Patreon ★Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Previous Episode

Joe Wilding: The Future of Aviation: Part 2 - The Shape of the Future
As the last Boeing 747 rolls off the assembly line at Everett, the once distinctive shape of the airliners we have known have become the norm. But with the changes in power source we discussed in Part 1 coming into effect, the shape of the aircraft of the future will adapt to make the best use of them. Aerospace engineer Joe Wilding returns to help us look at what the Shape of the Future may be. Oh, and we chat about Nuclear Aircraft too.
Follow Joe on Twitter here: https://twitter.com/joe_wilding
Check out all our social media channels at: https://www.damcasterspod.com
Join the fun on Patreon! Join from just £3+VAT a month to get ad-free episodes, chat with Matt and grab some merch. Check out the link below for more info.
The Damcasters © 2022 by Matt Bone is licensed under Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International
★ Support this podcast on Patreon ★Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Next Episode

Thomas McKelvey Cleaver: The Bridgebusters - Joseph Heller, Catch-22 and the 57th Bomb Wing
Catch-22 is one of my favourite books. My battered paperback copy lives on my bedside table. I have the fancy Folio Society edition on the shelf too. As an unashamed B-25 nut, I do bang on about how the Mike Nichols adaptation, written by Buck Henry, basically saved all the flying B-25s we still have. But, how much of it is true? Heller certainly always maintained he had made it up. Author, historian and screenwriter Thomas McKelvey Cleaver took a look into Heller's war and the 57th Bomb Wing for his book The Bridgebusters, which is finally getting a UK release. Tom found that fact and fiction are a lot closer than Joe Heller ever admitted to.
You can buy Thomas McKelvey Thomas' The Bridgebusters: The True Story of the Catch-22 Bomb Wing at our Bookshop here: https://uk.bookshop.org/a/11015/9781684513635
Tom's book on the USAAF's attacks on the Gothic Line, Gothic Line 1944-45: The USAAF starves out the German Army, part of Osprey's Air Campaign series can be found here: https://uk.bookshop.org/a/11015/9781472853417
Check out all our social media channels at: https://www.damcasterspod.com
Join the fun on Patreon! Join from just £3+VAT a month to get ad-free episodes, chat with Matt and grab some merch. Check out the link below for more info.
The Damcasters © 2022 by Matt Bone is licensed under Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International
★ Support this podcast on Patreon ★
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
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