Hauksbee

Thanks Creaghorn. After listening, backing it up and re-listening, several times, it sounds to me like "rikt-hooven". Am I close?

Right. I have been dropping that second 'h'. Thanks Hasse.

Olham to the rescue! Thanks, mate. [North and South pronounce it the same? That's a revelation. For years I've thought northern Germans spoke a more gutteral version, and the south spoke a softer version.]

'Been watching a lot of YouTube videos on WWI lately and folks seem divided on whether von Richtofen is pronounced with a hard 'ch' [Rik-tofen] or a soft 'ch' [Rish-tofen]. The former is to be expected of northern German, the latter of southern German.

...and his mate, 'Snowy' Evans. Dark horse claimants for shooting down von Richtofen. That tears it! You guys are too good.

I checked the availables on Amazon.com, and "Biggles of 266" was listed. I bought a copy, hardbound & used for $7.40 (+ shipping). I really want to find out how he brings down that Rumpler.

Manfred von Richtofen. Those steely little toddler eyes are tracking something. I really thought the Udet pic looked totally unlike any other of him. Here we go again...if you guys get this one, it'll be up to you to dazzle us, Jim.

OK. Let's try one more once...

Sorry, Eric. You're absolutely right! I was watching a YouTube 4-parter on WWI. When that pic was flashed on the screen, the narrator was talking about Billy Barker, so I thought it was Barker. Well, on to the next...

Nope.

If you hang around in WWI circles long enough, sooner or later the name "Biggles" will come up. "Biggles" (Bigglesworth) was the creation of Capt.W.E.Johns (himself a WWI pilot). Starting around 1932, Johns embarked on a project that would last his lifetime: taking the story of his hero through WWI, the inter-war years, and through WWII. These books were, admittedly, adolescent reading, but a good cut above the rest of the field. The standard narrative usually went something like (1) two young stalwarts, Frank and Jack (2) inadvertently find themselves posted to a place which is about to erupt into a slaughter of historical proportions, e.g., The Somme,The Battle of Jutland, or Bloody April. (3) They soldier on manfully, rarely garnering so much as a scratch, (4) defeating scads of Huns, (5) all the while spouting patriotic nonsense. Biggles is more of a well-rounded character; one who is heroic only reluctantly and respects the German pilots. Biggles often experiences real fear. This is undoubtedly because W.E.Johns wrote from his own experiences. Over his lifetime, Johns wrote 102 Biggles novels.(made it through WWII) He died in 1968. Amazon.com has a goodly sampling of the Biggles books. I just finished reading the first, "Biggles Learns To Fly".

Lots of good archival footage from the early days of Zeppelins. (Germany, Britain & America)

I assumed from this that he was born in France and more than likely lived there for a while. I looked up Claude Dornier, and found that he was born in Kempten, Bavaria. Is it possible that he inherited French citizenship through his father?

It was reported that when Hiram Maxim was in Russia drumming up customers for his new gun, he was approached by a group of young czarist officers. They called on him at his hotel, on the evening before the scheduled demonstration. They explained that they were giving him the opportunity to pack and quietly slip out of town. Maxim asked why he should do such a thing. They explained that he was sure to be unmasked as a fraud since it had be "scientifically proved that it was impossible to pull that handle on the side 550 times a minute."

So...what went wrong?

Nice account of early German aviation, and the rise of Claude Dornier and Willi Messerschmidt. The latter half turns into a puff-piece for post-War revival of the German aviation industry.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/retropolis/wp/2017/05/29/my-burial-is-of-no-import-the-american-pilots-who-fought-for-france-in-wwi/?utm_term=.234381fb8a59

Is it possible to access the Damage Model Folder, as we do in WOFF and change things?

The Wikipedia article that sparked this query described the D.VI thusly: "These aircraft combined a set of scaled-down D.VII wings with a fuselage and empennage closely mirroring those of the earlier Dr.I." The implication being that the D.VII existed before the D.VI. Of course, the D.VI could have been on the drawing board first and set aside, or, both planes created in parallel.

+1

As any ROF pilot knows so well!

When you put it that way, I'd have to agree.

Aha! Thanks.