Airplanes, Women, and Song

By: Allan Forsyth and Boris Sergievsky and Adam Hochschild

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Synopsis: Boris Sergievsky was one of the most colorful of the early aviators. He made his first flight less than ten years after the Wright brothers made theirs; he made his last only four years before the first Concorde took off.Born in Russia, Sergievsky learned to fly in 1912. In World War I, he became a much-decorated infantry officer and then a fighter pilot. During the Russian Civil War that followed, he fought on three fronts against the Bolsheviks.Coming to America in 1923, the first job he could find in New York was with a pick and shovel, digging the Holland Tunnel, but he soon joined Igor Sikorsky's airplane company. He became chief test pilot for the Sikorsky flying boats that Pan American Airways used worldwide, setting seventeen world aviation records along the way.Sergievsky also flew pioneering flights across uncharted African and Latin American jungles, flew with Lindbergh, and tested early helicopters and jets. Through it all, his sense of humor remained intact, as did his passion for beautiful women.In 1934 Sergievsky dictated this lively and personal memoir. A natural storyteller, his recollections are as clear and vivid as any reader could hope for. Editors Allan Forsyth and Adam Hochschild, who knew Sergievsky well during his later years - he was Hochschild's uncle - have added three dozen sidebars and more than 40 rare photographs to put Sergievsky's memoir in context for today's readers.