This fine leather-bound first print presentation copy came out in 1979 in a limited edition of 500 copies. Mine is signed by the author and by Lt. General Yarborough, the founder of the paratroops. It has a dedication by the author for a veteran.
This book is still readily available in reprint and I would very much recommend it. With 717 pages it’s a big book and it’s lavishly illustrated with 20 maps and over 200 photographs, covering the period from the inception , the Test Platoon and training, up to North Africa, Sicily, Salerno etc… all the way to the Rhine Crossing and Japan.
‘Pathfinders – In the Company of Strangers’ is a movie from earlier this year and now released on DVD. I hadn’t heard about it, but when I saw it on display at the bookstore, it looked interesting. Pathfinders and their equipment are the most intriguing aspect of airborne history, so I was hoping to catch a glimpse of custom pathfinder uniforms, bags, Eureka beacons, Aldis lamps etc. And sadly, a glimpse is all I got. But far worse was the movie script and the poor acting. It’s really dull and not worth your money. If you can get it cheap next year or so, I still recommend you buy the DVD, because it includes the 55-minute documentary ‘Geronimo’ about US paratroopers in Normandy, which is far better than the movie and does include interesting period footage and interviews with veteran paratroopers of the 101st and 82nd Airborne. Kind of like the interviews that the Band of Brothers episodes start with.
This here is a nice recent addition to my collection. A box for 15 jump wings from the American Emblem Co, at Utica N.Y. These wings were marked A.E. Co. at the back. I also have one of those wings, but not from this box. The jump wings in this box came in their own jewel cases, but I didn’t buy those.
I was familiar with the tins of black paratrooper boot polish, also by Corcoran, but I had never seen one of these before until I ran into one this month. It is a small bottle with brown liquid boot dye and has the Corcoran brand. Corcoran is the best known manufacturer of the famous lace-up paratrooper boots. The label is not dated, so I am not sure if these are war-time, or early post war. But a neat paratrooper item anyway!