The Spirit of St. Louis

For a man who describes himself as uninterested in spelling and grammar, Charles Lindbergh has written a wonderful book, completely worthy of a Pulitzer Prize. Lindbergh's book "The Spirit of St. Louis" follows his successful effort to become the first person to make a trans-Atlantic flight. Most regarded him initially as a crank -- too inexperienced and relying only on one-engine... but in the end his guts and courage carry him across the ocean to France. The story is told in great detail from the birth and of an idea to the construction of his airplane to an hour by hour account of his flight. Some of the tale gets bogged down a bit as he reminisces during the huge amount of downtown in the flight but overall this is a great account.

The Spirit of St. Louis was published in 1953, 26 years after Lindbergh's non-stop flight from NY to Paris. I believe he'd written two previous books about this flight. This book won him the Pulitzer Prize for biography in 1954.

Lindbergh begins his story in Fall 1927, as he's flying air mail from St. Louis to Chicago in rebuilt WWI biplanes, in all sorts of weather. When the challenge of making a flight no one has yet accomplished takes hold, he solicits--and receives--more financial support than he expected. He had a well-defined image of the plane he wanted for the flight, and when he couldn't find it, he hired a small manufacturer in San Diego that designed and built it. In only a couple of months. He flew this new plane non-stop to show more St. Louis, 14 hours, his first night-flight. St. Louis to Long Island was another non-stop.

Then the big challenge. And big success.

Lindbergh packed a lot into this book. The long flight is interspersed with flashbacks to his childhood, his education, his training as a flier, and stories of his days barnstorming the midwest--giving folks their first airplane ride over their hometowns or farms, performing aerobatics, doing deviltry like wing-walking and parachute jumps. By including his flight logs, you learn that in the first few hours of the flight, passing over New England, Nova Scotia, and Newfoundland, his altitude seldom exceeded 500 feet. He used road maps to help locate landmarks and keep him on course. As he crossed the North Atlantic, in contrast, he soared to as much as 10,000 feet to avoid cloud cover and fog. Over the ocean, he had to rely on compass readings and mental calculations to adjust for estimated wind drift to navigate. The plane's airspeed never topped 110 mph.

Heroics, you learn, are less about surviving daring-do than about careful, through planning, calculating the risks, knowing yourself and what you are capable of. Lindbergh did all that. A single-engine (two or three would simply require more fuel), a solitary pilot (extra bodies are extra weight), a no-frills craft with enormous fuel capacity. Entertaining and informative. show less

Fantastic. The story is so unique, and Lindbergh's telling is so real and down-to-earth (how ironic). What I enjoyed the most was the way the narrative recalled those days from not-so-long-ago: how unusual it was for a plane to fly overhead (people came running to see, schools let out, businesses closed), how early it was in the lifecycle of aviation (crude instruments, no radio, open cockpits), and how amazing the New York-to-Paris flight was at the time (Lindbergh flying solo for 36 hrs, no reliable weather forecasts or current information, over an open ocean). Makes me feel sheepish for complaining about a 5 hour delay in Philly.

Incredibly well-written and interesting story of Lindbergh's life prior to and during his historic flight. I care little for airplane facts or the history of flight, but this book held my interest all the way through.

The story behind the autobiographical The Spirit of St. Louis, published 60-years ago this fall, is interesting because Lindbergh spent 14 years working on it, putting in more effort than actually flying across the Atlantic, and perhaps even his entire 5-year flying career to that point. He wrote and re-wrote the 600 pages at least 6 times, laboring over semi-colons and words to an exacting degree. The book has a structure that reflects the experience of being alone while struggling mentally through uncertainty and final achievement. It's one of the greatest works of American 'outdoor literature', and memoirs, of the 20th century and will be read (and readable) for a long time. As novelist John P. Marquand observed, "It has a timeless show more quality and an authentic strength and beauty that should cause it to be read by this generation and by many following — as long, in fact, as anyone is left who cares for fine writing and high courage." show less

Excellent book. Lindbergh began work on the book in 1939, and it went through 6 drafts before publication. His wife, Anne Lindbergh, offered her experience in helping Lindbergh to edit the book. Lindbergh's original book, "We", as an unsatisfactory product that was rushed to market in July 1927. He had only 3 weeks to work on that book, and was never satisfied with the product. With years under his belt and 14 years under writing, The Spirit of St. Louis is a wonderful book masterfully told.

Excellent book. Lindbergh began work on the book in 1939, and it went through 6 drafts before publication. His wife, Anne Lindbergh, offered her experience in helping Lindbergh to edit the book. Lindbergh's original book, "We", as an unsatisfactory product that was rushed to market in July 1927. He had only 3 weeks to work on that book, and was never satisfied with the product. With years under his belt and 14 years under writing, The Spirit of St. Louis is a wonderful book masterfully told.