Rattlesnake Bomber Base: Pyote Army Airfield in World War II.Rattlesnake rattlesnake, poisonous New World snake of the pit viper family, distinguished by a rattle at the end of the tail. The head is triangular, being widened at the base. The rattle is a series of dried, hollow segments of skin, which, when shaken, make a whirring sound. Bomber Base: Pyote Army Airfield in World War II. By Thomas E. Alexander. (Abilene, Tex.: State House Press, c. 2005. Pp. 216. Paper, $18.95, ISBN ISBN abbr. International Standard Book Number ISBN International Standard Book Number ISBN n abbr (= International Standard Book Number) → ISBN m 1-880510-90-1.) Thomas E. Alexander, author of two previous books about the history of the Army Air Force in Texas during World War II, focuses his attention here on Pyote Army Airfield, a sprawling air base in the West Texas desert where heavy bomber A heavy bomber is a bomber aircraft of the largest size, and typically longest ranges. The term was used primarily prior to and during World War II, when engine power was so scarce that designs had to be carefully tailored to their missions. crews were formed and trained between 1943 and 1945. Rattlesnake Bomber Base: Pyote Army Airfield in World War H argues that Pyote's wartime experience provides a typical example of a pattern of desolation, growth, and decline that occurred where army airfields were planned during the Great Depression and deactivated after the war. Starting with a brief history of Pyote and its environs, Alexander discusses the creation of the air base and the activities that took place there during and after World War II and ends with a tour of the ruins that have remained since the base's closure in 1963. The book depends largely on accounts from local newspapers and secondary research rather than on federal, state, county, or private business archival records to document the military and political decision making for planning and constructing the base, the training of the bomber crews, daily life on the base for military and civilian personnel, and the base's economic effects on the town and surrounding Ward County. What emerges is a work that provides a wealth of local color local color n. 1. The interest or flavor of a locality imparted by the customs and sights peculiar to it. 2. The use of regional detail in a literary or an artistic work. and anecdotal evidence anecdotal evidence, n information obtained from personal accounts, examples, and observations. Usually not considered scientifically valid but may indicate areas for further investigation and research. concerning the experiences of airmen and civilians in Pyote rather than a broadly focused comparative or analytical framework that would support the author's assertion that Pyote represents a microcosm of small-town America reinvigorated through rearmament re·arm v. re·armed, re·arm·ing, re·arms v.tr. 1. To arm again. 2. To equip with better weapons. v.intr. To arm oneself again. . While the book succeeds as a work of local history, the author's attempt to craft a sweeping, grandiloquent gran·dil·o·quence n. Pompous or bombastic speech or expression. [From grandiloquent, from Latin grandiloquus : grandis, great + narrative laden with dramatic superlatives, adjectives, and adverbs leads him to internal inconsistencies, such as referring to the West Texas landscape as "naturally tortured" on one page but "relatively flat" on the next (p. 13). It also produces unsubstantiated generalizations and questionable historical judgments, such as that Franklin Delano Roosevelt had "broken the Depression" in 1939 by establishing army airfields throughout the country (p. 46). What happened at Pyote during the war is an extraordinary enough story, and while the author's passion is manifest, it often results in overbearing prose and passages. Those looking for Looking for In the context of general equities, this describing a buy interest in which a dealer is asked to offer stock, often involving a capital commitment. Antithesis of in touch with. information on local history in West Texas during the 1930s and 1940s will find this book useful. But from a military, political, or socioeconomic perspective, the topic invites further and more rigorous research. Rattlesnake Bomber Base presents a micro-historical case study, and one with merit, but its author fails to provide it with the macro-level socioeconomic context of America's mobilization for war that his thesis demands. CHRISTOPHER KOONTZ U.S. Army Center of Military History The Center of Military History (CMH) is responsible for the appropriate use of history throughout the United States Army. Traditionally, this mission meant recording the official history of the Army in both peace and war, while advising the Army Staff on historical matters. |
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