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Skunk Works: A Personal Memoir of My Years at Lockheed by Ben Rich is really good
by sachleen 8y ago
Skunk Works: A Personal Memoir of My Years at Lockheed by Ben Rich is really good
- mannykannot 8y agoUnfortunately, there's not much about Johnson in it, especially not his early career.
- justin66 8y agoI remember getting a good sense of the man from Ben Rich's book.
- iscrewyou 8y agoYeah. The books isn’t about Kelly Johnson but he gets referred back to a lot in cases of “what would he do” or “he told me to go the other way” or “kelly knew better in that instance”. It’s almost like Ben Rich bouncing ideas of Kelly while he isn’t present.
- mannykannot 8y agoDoes it cover his role in the development of the P-38, the F-104, the NF-104A or the U2? I don't think so, but my memory may be faulty.
- justin66 8y agoI believe the earlier stuff is mentioned in passing when talking about Kelly Johnson's history but the more modern stuff Ben Rich worked on understandably gets more attention, with the bulk of it about the Blackbird and the F-117. He spent some space talking about the U-2 and that material is the kind of thing I had in mind when talking about how the book gives an impression of Kelly Johnson. For example, prior to reading the book I didn't know that while the CIA people expected downed pilots to kill themselves, Kelly Johnson thought that was nuts, was sympathetic to Francis Gary Powers, and gave him a job as a test pilot when he returned from captivity. I think the book is well written and accomplishes a lot with small anecdotes like that one. It was a lucky find for me. I pulled it off a bookshelf in an airport convenience store because it was the only book that didn't look insanely boring.
- errantspark 8y agoI'll second this recommendation, it isn't about that damned swede, but it does give you some sense of his magnitude.
- Zolomon 8y agoWhich Swede are you referring to?
- jessaustin 8y agohttps://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19516935 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19516935
- errantspark 8y agoSorry, it was a bit opaque but there's a famous quote by Hall Hibbard about Johnson I was referencing "That damned Swede can actually see air."