True Aviation Picture-Stories #14

When Leo LaBonte and John Caravello bail out of their damaged bomber over the battle line, the wind threatens to carry them toward enemy territory—until two Mustang pilots spot their predicament and spring into action. In a daring aerial maneuver, the fighters use their propeller wash to push the parachuting airmen back across the lines to safety. A sharp reminder that sometimes survival depends on split-second thinking and a wingman's quick action.

Bill McGill trades his saddle for a Corsair fighter plane, joining the Marine Air Corps when war calls and eventually shipping out with the Navy's carrier fleet in the South China Sea. When Japanese bombers threaten the USS Essex, McGill gets his chance to prove that his sharp instincts in the sky match his skill on the range—and his performance that day becomes the stuff of squadron legend. A true wartime tale of an American cowboy who found his calling in combat aviation.

Wing Commander Lionel Cohen refused to let age keep him grounded when World War II called—after fighting in three separate conflicts across five decades, this decorated RAF veteran wasn't about to accept a desk job when his country needed him in the air. From the Matabele War through the Boer conflict and into World War I, Cohen had earned his combat stripes; now, in his late sixties, he parlayed his distinguished record into permission to fly as an air gunner and observer on dangerous shipping strikes and U-boat hunts. His courage under fire—from dogfights over Norway to attacks on German warships—proved that experience and determination could match any younger pilot's nerve.