Warbird Information Exchange

I stumbled across another source the other day:

Providers (Name - Owner - Location - Date Established - Collection Size)

• WarbirdsRestoration.com - Ian Hudson/Bruce Bird/Copyzone Archiving Ltd - Dewsbury, United Kingdom - By 2001 - 28,000 original technical drawings and manuals

_________________
Tri-State Warbird Museum Collections Manager & Museum Attendant

Warbird Philosophy Webmaster

A recent visit to a late local modeler's house led me to discover that, long before Periscope Film, another company was creating a series of Air Force manual reprints. Flying Enterprises of Dallas, Texas reprinted at least three flight manuals:

They come in a cover/folder with a reproduction of the title page on the front, picture(s) of the aircraft on the back and a little 2 1/4" wide flap that overlaps the actual manual. The manual itself has the same three non-modern-standard width holes punched in it as the original manuals:

I haven't had the opportunity to do any research yet, but thanks to the aforementioned collection I am aware of three of them:

HB-1: T.O. 01-25CF-1 - Pilot's Flight Operating Instructions: P-40D and P-40E Airplanes

HB-2: N/A - Handbook of Operation and Flight Instructions for the Models YFM-1 and YFM-1B Multi-Place Fighter Airplanes and Model YFM-1A Multi-Place Fighter Airplane

HB-3: T.O. 1F-51D-1 - Flight Handbook: USAF Series F-51D Aircraft

The P-51H manual, being a bit thicker than the other two, has room on the spine for a title, and luckily, a date of reissue: January 1966. Both HB-1 and HB-3 have the same "Flying Enterprises" label on the first page of the manual itself, but, for some reason, HB-2 does not. HB-2 is particularly intriguing, as while the other two represent aircraft for which there were thousands of examples built, there were only around a dozen YFM-1s. Therefore, it would stand to reason that it would be especially difficult to get ones hands' on one.

As an aside, it just so happens that the three manuals chosen manage to illustrate the prewar, World War II and postwar title page formats as well as the change of technical order number format mentioned in a post in the technical order organization thread.

These, of course, aren't digital, but they were, at the time, fulfilling the same role - that is to say, civilians creating and distributing copies of military manuals - as the modern digital resellers.

EDIT (25-09-16): It turns out that "Flying Enterprises" was later renamed "Flying Enterprise Publications". The proof comes from a pair of copies of reprints of the F-51D Mustang Handbook for sale on eBay. One has the same Stinson Gullwing logo seen above, while the other lists "Flying Enterprise Publications" on the title page. Despite using different photographs on the cover, the styling makes it clear they are from the same publisher. For reference, Flying Enterprise Publications was Mitch Mayborn's company and also responsible for the "Guidebook" series that profiled manufacturers like Stearman, Cessna, Ryan and Grumman.

EDIT (26-04-21): Thanks to another recent discovery, it turns out the series continued beyond HB-3. According to page 1 of the Stearman Guidebook, it includes:

(Source: Mitch Mayborn, Stearman Guidebook, HB-6 (Dallas, Texas: Flying Enterprises, 1967), 1.)

Later editions of the Stearman Guidebook would add Peter M. Bowers as an author and become the first entry in the "American Aircraft Series", which is covered in a post in the Aircraft Profile Book Series Catalog thread.

_________________
Tri-State Warbird Museum Collections Manager & Museum Attendant

Warbird Philosophy Webmaster

Noha: Add this to your sources. It's where I ended up finding an almost complete IPB for the Fairchild. None of it is online, but they will copy anything for you, for the requisite fees. I was able to order my manual over the phone and had it in about a week or so.

https://wright.libraryhost.com/reposito ... sources/34

Here's the top page for the entire section of the library:

https://wright.libraryhost.com/