F4U CORSAIR IN ACTION
(Paperback)
SS10220

By Jim Sullivan
Now updated and expanded, Squadron’s just released new edition of
the F4U Corsair in Action includes 53 exciting new photographs
in 16 all new, additional pages. Bringing to mind the exploits of
“Pappy” Boyington and his “Blacksheep Squadron” and Tommy
Blackburn with the “Jolly Rogers,” the Corsair is among the most
formidable U.S. fighters of World War II. The F4U maintained a
kill ratio of 11:1 according to the United States Navy and went
on to serve American forces in Korea, holding its own in the
early years of the jet age. The Corsair was first conceived as a
high-speed, high-altitude fighter for the Navy in 1938 when
Chance Vought’s design team drew up plans for a fighter with a
1,800 h.p. engine and a huge 13-foot propeller. The Corsair’s
famous inverted gull wing design was introduced to allow prop
clearance. Handling problems delayed the aircraft’s deployment
aboard carriers, but Marine Corps pilots quickly took to the
powerful, rugged fighter and VMF-124, the first Marine squadron
to fly the Corsair in combat, also produced the first Corsair air
ace, Kenneth A. Walsh, by the summer of 1943. A total of 12,571
Corsairs were built between 1940 and 1952, most of them by
Vought, but hundreds by Goodyear and Brewster as those companies’
assembly lines had to be pressed into service to meet soaring
demand for the remarkable aircraft. Jim Sullivan’s exhaustive
volume surveys the history of the Corsair from its first
prototype to the restored warbirds that have continued to delight
air show audiences down to the present day.
Illustrated with 229 photographs, plus color profiles and
detailed line drawings; 80 pages.
ISBN 978-0-89747-623-2 Paperback