Race to Hawaii

June 18, 2018
In this entertaining account, journalist Ryan (Hell Bent: One Man’s Crusade to Crush the Hawaiian Mob) recounts the harrowing stories of the first efforts to reach Hawaii by air from California, which, at the dawn of aviation in the 1920s, was as fanciful—and as alluring—as flying to Mars seems now. Most travelers today don’t consider how difficult it was just a century ago to get to Hawaii at all, given the islands’ relative tininess in the expanse of the Pacific Ocean. But as flight technology improved in the wake of WWI, several American airmen—military and civilian—resolved to battle adverse weather, limited fuel-carrying capacity, and the navigational challenges of the 2,400-mile trip to try to win the honor of being first to fly there. An attempt by the U.S. Navy in 1925 left several men lost at sea for days. On
June 29, 1927, two Army officers accomplished the feat, landing in Oahu and becoming media sensations. Later that summer, 10 men competing in the Dole Derby, a contest sponsored by pineapple magnate James Dole, perished in their attempts to duplicate the feat. Aviation buffs, armchair adventurers, historians, and Hawaii aficionados will be unable to put down this gripping book.

June 15, 2018
A page-turning account of "the precarious, pioneering flights to Hawaii" during the late 1920s.Learning of Charles Lindbergh's 1927 trans-Atlantic flight, Hawaii pineapple tycoon James Dole immediately offered $25,000 (the same amount won by Lindbergh) for the first nonstop from Oakland, California, to Honolulu. The result was a spectacular story featuring dozens of heroes, not all of whom survived. Journalist Ryan (Hell-Bent: One Man's Crusade to Crush the Hawaiian Mob, 2014) enthusiastically narrates the exciting tale. Though the Dole Derby doesn't begin until Page 169, few readers will regret the author's account of earlier attempts. In 1925, a small Navy crew left Oakland in a flying boat but landed 450 miles short when the gas ran out. They spent 10 days drifting slowly toward the islands until they were rescued within sight of land, starving and nearly dead of thirst. In early 1927, two Army fliers carefully prepared a Fokker trimotor and enjoyed a mostly uneventful flight, arriving a month after Dole's announcement, making the derby an anticlimax. This did not discourage a crowd of eager applicants, and Ryan recounts their biographies, technical efforts, and flights, which include so many malfunctions that readers will conclude that Lindbergh was either a genius or very lucky. Of 15 planes that entered, seven dropped out because of mechanical problems, including several crashes. Eight left the starting line on Aug. 16, 1927; four aborted. Two of the four who continued landed in Honolulu, and two disappeared. One plane that aborted tried again and also disappeared. All told, 10 fliers died during the derby, causing James Dole to harbor "bitterness over his association with so many fliers' deaths."A vivid portrait of 1920s American aviation, whose dazzling technical progress could never keep up with the dangerously adventurous fliers who tested the limits of their fragile craft and often died in the process.

COPYRIGHT(2018) Kirkus Reviews, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

Starred review from July 1, 2018
Charles Lindbergh had scarcely landed in France in 1927 when the public, enamored of all things aviation, turned its attention to a new challenge, this time a Pacific Ocean flight. Pineapple mogul James Dole offered a prize to the crew of the first plane to fly from the American mainland to Hawaii, and the media trumpeted the competition. Earlier attempts to traverse the distance were fueled by military-service rivalries, and a trio of seaplanes under naval officer John Rodgers' command ran out of fuel and had to ditch. Despite a naval task force stretched out across the route, technical problems held them incommunicado before the crew eventually reached Kauai, starving and dehydrated. The army had better luck with Fokker aircraft and a bold pilot and creative navigator. Finally, the Dole Air Derby departed Oakland with eight planes competing. Ryan builds suspense skillfully and makes heroes out of the men and one woman who vied in the derby. Tragedy overtook most of these aviation pioneers, some at takeoff, some along the sea routes.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2018, American Library Association.)