Eagle

By Robert J Serling

The story of a great airline is the story of people, and nowhere is this more evident than at American Airlines.

Thus we meet giants of the industry such as C. R. Smith, the bookkeeper from an impoverished family who, more than any man, made American the colossus it is today, and Robert Lloyd Crandall, who in 1980 took over the presidency of the airline during one of its most troubled times and brought it through flying higher than ever. But we also meet pilots, mechanics, marketing experts, and scores of middle-management executives – all of whom Robert Serling brings alive with vivacity.

Eagle is the definitive, action-filled history of the airline that became one of the world’s recognized leaders in air transport-a company of both courage and controversy. It tells the story of the growth of American Airlines, from a hodgepodge of carriers operating biplanes over routes that went virtually nowhere, into a giant admired by even its fiercest competitors.

Robert J. Serling (1918-2010) was aviation editor of United Press International and won the annual TWA Best Aviation News Reporting Award for four years running.