shoes. now, short of being literally able to do that exercises what chris mentioned is precisely how to do that try to keep a sense of historical understand time moves forward, understand where the world was, where the country was, when the subject of your attention started out, where was when they finished off and and i think you'll come away with a lot more understanding not only of that historical figure about the broader historical story, including our nations story and and about the and about human nature generally. and every historian and biographer also writing from a particular moment, a particular context, which is the lens through which they're interpreting those. so that's why getting a bunch of different perspectives is important. sorry, we can't get to all of the questions that are the q&a, some wonderful, wonderful questions.

frank, what a great treat to chat with you. it's always a pleasure, my friend. likethis is for you out there.

every one of you pilots and crew members, right? soon you're going to be flying across the whole face of this globe or every possible of terrain over arctic jungle and desert. so get this straight, any land you fly over may someday have to walk over. in most cases, the walking isn't so good. take a dozen instance that means a lot of spots besides africa. there's china and the gobi desert, australia and the great sandy, plus the desert lands of arabia, iran and western india.

all of them are up, all of them are dry, hot and without mercy. for the men who don't know. this is the kind of country where you're fired during the day, when you can shiver with cold at night, where a man would his soul for a drink of water during the north african, a lot of our men found out about the hard way, which is the only way the desert teaches anything. that's why you have to know it the fight against the desert is a fight to the finish. and someone in her crew can testify, to that point. here's where they crash landed. one day in late summer, far off course they the blasting energy and target out of the war and after paying the enemy for the pleasure of doing it they got it right it hurts the most. the aircraft knocked out one of the engines, the message spread to the rest. the b-24 riddled from nose to

tail. the navigator and radio gunner both wounded. the fight, even getting this far, was a rugged field. for the first time, these boys found just how big our anti-air desert can be. down in the middle of nothing, it looked a lot different than it did from 10,000 feet and not a lot different within hour after they'd crawled out of a ship and busy, they had a pretty fair idea of the spot they were in. no matter how they tried to ignore it, no matter how they tried to laugh it off. fine. anybody feel normal or you can stop heat. it's the humidity clearly over when i'm brown on one side. what a joke. quit thinking about that on my first year and a lot of good that'll do five gallons of water just to help put temptation that messerschmitt pilot must have been a tailor back in berlin. hey, when you get your radio fixed up, george, have them drop

a slide case of cold coke right away. we have a hell of a joke. we had a portable with us. we wouldn't have to wait for that mess in the ship to start working. we'll be out here by tonight. but you know, the one we had on the ship was being repaired. you were there yesterday when she already took it out of the radio shop. why didn't you bring a good one along? nobody stopped you. that and the 15 minutes they gave it to take off. i should have brought a thermos of coffee and fruit juices and checked every emergency, kept to. huh? well, why didn't you or joe. or anybody quiet, you guys. things are tough enough as it is. besides, you ever thought end up this way, or what are we laying around for? why don't we get out of here? that ship, there's another fly us out. we got to walk now. cut it out. fell i mean of skipper why we're wasting time with all this what chance have a lieutenant shorty without a doctor? we got to bring one back. we don't even have enough water to lay around here and wait for off cars. and a man walking out there on the desert has about as much chance of being spotted from the air as he has of hetty lamar out there behind some sand. you are going to stick right here the ship as long as we can,

crossing that desert and coming out on top. and just about 1000 to 1 shot. we're going to stay right here for at least three days and hope that somebody passes after that. and well, maybe a couple of hours we'll take a shot at going out to help. but that's our last, longest chance of them all. i am. and sit down someplace. i guess it's just about time we got a few other things straightened out to our way off. any main and nobody back at the base. just what happened or where we are. we're not small, father. just make your 30. but still we're lucky to be out of enemy territory. or we'd have to burn the ship. so in case anything does, i can bury or burn the stuff in a minute. good deal. larry ellison. i don't want anybody going out into the sun. if you do a cinch for heatstroke or heat exhaustion out here with

the water, we've got, that means you're finished. so we'll work only at night or in the morning. things be a little ragged. i know, but we'll manage, all right. if we keep our heads and go on the water supplies here can figure out a way to repair the radio. i'll try, sir. we'll take a fix with the sextant. this thing just where we are. be sure you keep the navigators. quick. round up, george. okay. now, first of all, the water is going to be rationed. that is a big worry. water. and without it, nothing else mattered. as the brine came to just 27 gallons sounds a lot does about 27 gallons of water. but listen that to be split equally with all the crew except the two wounded men who would need more than the others in order to live for these others one for a man for a day that last time exactly ten days and the first 12 hours. nobody outside of the two casualties would get one single drop to drink to the planning.

but and bearable and wise so let's get organized. yeah. do you have any ideas? yeah you see that section right over there beyond that dune. well i think that ought to make a pretty good landing strip. it looks solid. not too many big rocks. it should be easier to clear then if a plane show up, it could land. we could even rig a landing key with one of the parachute folks. and. and then i'll make players out of, well, go, guys, let's get started. but on george they don't rush things in the desert and you don't work until it gets dark. keep your shirt on too. unless you want to boil a member heatstroke now we've got to get some ground signals out of we don't want to get caught with our pants that looks pretty up there. it's fairly high i think. be a good idea. we made some oil and sand fires up there for distress signal and if we find some bushes, we can bring them to, we can find the signal need right here in the emergency manual. and by the way, joe, did you get the signal flares out of the ship right here and signal

panels till, you know, we could scrape the camouflage, the top of this wing. the reading that took that first night show, going to be 400 miles from their base 60 miles from the nearest marked water shelter. well, this b-24, with its high, gave me one good break and i saw roof and all that fire isn't for long, but for cooking and, you can make a stove out of any old can just use the sand dredged with oil and little gasoline to get us. and speaking of dinner, i remember the desert heat hoses, the spoilage of foods that don't let us stand and open the food, the tents made for their crew, knives. just 102 degrees can be called cool, was built out of tubing in parachute craft as a matter fact, you'll find parachutes are invaluable for countless things for screams, for shade sleeping bags. but signaling an airplane their one big hope, george got busy on landing strip markers filled

with oil sands, wrapped in a cloth with lights in in after scraping on the wing for a while, phil decided that an easier way to get a reflecting surface was just to use cowling or any piece from the interior of the ship that already had a shiny surface. george detail was signal fire and. that's where the oil cans came in. again in daytime when a trailer smoke is worth a dozen fires, he'll add rubber to the oil sands mixture. but now flames thing. no rubber less oil, more gas. there'll be nine of those fires set in one large cross for sign. that medical help is needed, but help when it comes a place to land. so and bob are clearing a strip for an emergency runway since the landing hadn't been broken when they came down. sam and larry took them out of the wings and surprised enough ride together to hook them up to the batteries batteries.

well, i try to send our beams pretty high. so they're after run up the engines don't use that much of the juice in the batteries. you can't close very personal cartridges. yeah. by the way, i figure we can send one up every 2 hours. that'll be four and eight. we'll have enough for 12 days. okay. i don't know. now we'd better make it three a night and leave as a reserve project while we light up the work, see what it looks like. okay with me? i'm all for getting picked up right now. they work pretty well at first night. first thing? sure that they were still full of energy and a lack of water had begun to cut into that energy. but there was nothing out on the desert or up the spot that signals that night. nothing.

fell. what are you doing? i'm taking my share of the water and getting out here while your crew will be lost in an on your own. nothing's going to pick it out of here. somebody's got to listen to me, phil. you don't know you're doing. we've got to stick together. suppose you don't come back, then we got to go looking for. that'll take more water. now, if you don't care about yourself, think of the rest of us. i don't want anybody to go looking for me. if i make it, it's okay. we're not okay. i don't. it's my business. i want you stupid little clerical. okay. get in your straitjacket and take or i'm crazy. you guys are saying only remember what you're doing is desertion desertion. okay, joe, i'll stick out, but i'm you. we're never going to get out of here.

the start of a second day with the temperature topping 100 degrees before 9:00 in the morning, hot, burning days, nights that bring little relief, that's the summer desert for you. in the winter, you've got the and the nights that are really cold and winter or summer that maybe sandstorms anywhere look at it it's never any good shorty. take it slow now is it any any better? as you get a little stronger, you have to give. george, some tips on how to fix the radio. he can get a piece of our fan in joe because i love flying when he wakes up again. i used to mind as much that ointment on his eyes. yeah.

good work, man. that ought to make it a lot better. all right, bob, try to use some of the sunburn gel. you're burned already. we're to larry. i think dr. carrano. going to tell us on smell the front of him this morning. maybe the can dirty my ration had a greasy taste to it. i hope it wasn't polluted. sam was playing it safe all. right. but there's no sense in taking a chance. first, the harrison tablets must be crushed to her every quart. usually it takes anywhere from 20 to 30 minutes for the tablets to work. you can tell when the water is ready because you can smell of chlorine. sometimes taste it. but the water that really needs your attention. is the water native wells and villages. i always assume that water has a water come several than 20

minutes. and remember when, you do get it. don't slop it down all at once. once your lips first and then rinse it around your mouth. that's what the arabs do. take it slowly and in small sips from tomorrow on we get a pint in the morning on friday night. skipper james coming. get get him a to joe give him a drink some reserved are you feeling boy. the third day with no no let up in the heat no improvement in the wounded but there was one improvement at that third day in living quarters a double fly bombing for the front porch that air space between those layers

of cloth lower the temperature quite a bit they've done the same thing as there it or that flap that's raised now to gain air circulation to lose just a little more heat. those are trips that are priceless. try to remember launches. that only picked that service on our way out of the mission was right. save percentage for car massaging and put on your goggles the glares got a cnn thinking double. okay, give me another car. no no at all from those signals

all through the third night on the desert. that's how i'd one no results from the radio no fall of do they get together. that's something else to remember. there's business about do because want to build up your water supply right from the very start our hole lined with canvas and a better rock to catch the moisture that'll work if there's any of the catch that was just it there wasn't a drop and pieces of metal left out overnight that's a good idea to not today. not even on the wing of the plane those takes are if you're lucky these boys, they pick the driest season of the year in which to settle down a desert. the fourth day out with the men growing weaker, the water sinking lower in the containers and sign of help of any kind sam knew then they'd the point where

something had to be done seems to be the only thing we can sam know. i guess, is the day man. nothing showing up. i got to do something about it. but. we are here. the base is over here and the nearest oasis is here, 60 miles southeast of us at about six days walking distance for men in our condition. now way. i figured two of us should make a stab at walking to that oasis. and if one should weaken the other, one might get through a but they'll each need three gallons of water for the hike. i don't think a quarter a day is nearly enough for that much strength. if they drink one gallon of it

slowly and then 12 hours before they leave, it won't be so much to carry for six gallons from what we have now, our enough for about eight days when they go if we stay on the same rations. i told you we should have pulled out of here. now we don't even have the strength to walk. we to stay here and fight. if anything had flown over us, they would have thought of the airplane and breaks were against us. so nothing did. i think i ought to make try, man. i know the desert little better and gale can take over for me here. we can keep the signals going when i'm gone. give us a chance both ways. now, what do you think i'm to do? or are you're going to take with the skipper? well. how about you, bob? what's going to be holding all right? i'm fine, skipper. good. and i understand this one thing very clearly, bill there's going to be the boss around here and. whatever he says about rations or anything else goes that i

understood just fine well. i start tonight. you have to travel light in the desert. you just don't travel water. you'll take a maximum load of that, and that means a minimum of everything else. sam took only the essentials. goggles compass, flashlight, night, magic bandages. i said i had done sunburn, lotion and then came the food items from the k rations, biscuits, fruit, chocolate bars, dextrose tablets.

joel built a pack, sam out of a regular parachute pack. he stripped it, cut it off the excess harness and made a pack that was practically made light compress it simple. it proves the point. all right. a little ingenuity can turn a ordinary parts of a plane's equipment, a whole kit of life saving can make the difference between give up and going. the emergency drinking water containers were filled the trek a small air space had been left in them, so they'd float in case they at sea. at sea fill them up, girl.

those won't be doing much floating. meanwhile, gary used the very pistol kit as a base for a pack for bob, it's lighter than a parachute, but not as comfortable for a long trek and parachute. clothes will not only serve as a cover for the pack, make an acceptable tent for them on. that trip george made dust masks and spiral, putting. that's right from a parachute. the parties are a must for walking in deep soft sand and he traded shoes with bob because nothing short of guys can take that desert trek remember well you always try and shoes you can walk home in if that's what got to do and phil turned out some walking sticks hollow tubing that would also double as poles later on. by 2100 that night after a couple of hours sleep they got ready to go sand plant on traveling until daybreak, they wanted to make 25 miles the

first two nights and average about ten a night from then on. yeah, they were said even to taking a lot of blood chips and money, which were to soften up any natives they might run into. they felt that if the chips wouldn't work the money purse the money and plenty tact and diplomacy always must with natives desert jungle or anywhere else. well that was that. let's try this thing on, skipper. lot swap. but you don't want to buckle under your arm. listen, a little action, okay okay? hey, bob, here's another box. the dextrose tablets digging in your pocket. okay. i put some gum in your pocket, too, bob. thanks. there's your pro. well looks like i'm all set. hey, wait a minute. what are you going to use? oh, i'll be okay.

yeah, about. thank you. it's up to you to take care of things around here. keep working at the radio. and if the batteries get, we run up the good engines for a while. but keep them covered. a sandstorm might come up. i'll be here and watch out for jim and shorty and burn those signals. something's bound to work. i hope it's accounting accurate as a feel that's going to be strength. i'll make sure that boy's wounds are covered with soap about it and always bandage it. i want to take any chances are infectious and keep up the log you make a good racket right bob how about you've already you better. i remember everybody, bob and i have charted our course the right place southeast of here i we'll try to leave some kind of a marker whenever we can. so if you get picked up, you can track us down that way. well, i guess that's it.

yeah. good luck. thank you. if you don't fly over us before, we get to the oasis. we'll be back with help in about seven days. and phil, that doesn't mean that you want to go on a warm binge on a six day skipper? no, i. would you take this. of phil? come on, bob. come on, fellas. let's get the fire spread. is that the signal.

they had done all they could? they're various signals panels, reading, need, medical attention. now, all they need is a plane to see them. nothing more to do. nothing that is make waiting as endurable as possible. okay, so i'll try tonight for a little time. bob and sam weren't doing so badly. they were up 13 miles the first night. now they were taking it with no natural shade available. they use their walking sticks upright to set up their parachute, then to prepare those beds they dug down into the sand down where it's several degrees cooler, comfortable?

well, it could be a whole lot worse worse. the point is you want to know the angles and whatever instance when there were a range, they wouldn't have that dry riverbed. a flash flood could send a raging water roaring down upon them. and a very few seconds time. and in the winter, too, they might have found water to drink in the lowest point, a bend of that channel a few feet beneath. the bed they are in a native waterhole, but this is the bone dry part summer when. there's just not a drop anywhere. oh oh, the temperature under that wing are the sixties was. 129 129. you perspire that kind of weather. no matter how strong are and you sweat the soft of your body. that's not good because our lack of that can cause cramps and heat exhaustion with salt

tablets. sure, that just what you need if you've got plenty of water but these lads haven't so they're doing the next best thing they. keep their perspiration to a minimum and conserve what they have in their system. this was the second day of their trek and sam and bob are beginning to find out just how walking across the desert can be. it took plenty of willpower not to strip, but sam knew that the arabs where they closed for a reason. the evaporation of perspiration, a definite cooling effect stripped to the skin. the perspiration will be gone too soon. the cooling effect over too quickly. how far we come to keep. that 25 months. that's what i get. by my count,. 25 miles, not even halfway.

don't think about it, kid. for i was trying to get some water last. when you get this, you may be tempted to drink any liquid the alcohol in your compass, your own urine, gasoline or even oil don't. that's the quickest way to lose the fight. it takes willpower and guts to stand the gas. remember, a lot good men have beaten the desert. it's tough, but can be done. hey, i'll be at the shop. by sandstorm can be murdered.

the only thing to do is button up your clothing put a dust master cloth over your mouth and nose and duck in or whatever shelters available. don't go running around looking for shelter. you're liable to get off course. and if the sand piling up around you, roll over.

yeah, but i. i'm george so we can see. sure, sure. i. it's a little like it wasn't. two guys ever heard of a large. used.

for.

rain.

i. picked up george but it the way run away fell flat straight up so. george starts on.

our men skipper and bob went for help so. righto, man. they sent us and they're okay coming out with. yes. these boys beat the rams, beat the decision with a combination of brains and guts and luck, learned to stay alive the hard way. and so a little less than one month later, at a desert base in north africa, the crew of the fifth entry joined this group and was back in operational flight. a crew of people on the second day. one of the most. of the difference, and it was

also a different crew, different because it rises and never again will these men be without any one of those vital items of emergency equipment. they will carry them their plane and they shoot bags in their pockets. those that are weapons, weapons with which to battle a desert and wind the easy way. hurry up. well, okay, skipper. and.