75 Years of Lockheed Martin Skunk Works by Jim Goodall

overscan (PaulMM)

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"It's a pictorial with 332 pages, hardbound, 1,093 photos of which over 50% of the photos have never been in print. I cover 43 different programs from the XP-80 to the SR-72 and the Skunk Works Compact Fusion Reactor. It will full of never before seen color shots, behind the scenes and production lines. If you have seen my "Pictorial History of the B-2A Spirit" book or my "Pictorial History of the Lockheed SR-71," or my submarine series, then you will have a good idea of how and what my book will look like."
 

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Are they taking pre-orders yet?
Seems like Amazon UK are @ £44.31 ! Linky

"This pictorial journey will take the reader from the very beginning of the Skunk Works' very first project (XP-80 Shooting Star) and follow the program through prototype build-up, first flight and, if they reached the frontline, operational service.
This pictorial journey will take the reader from the very beginning of the Skunk Works' very first project (XP-80 Shooting Star) and follow the program through prototype build-up, first flight and, if they reached the frontline, operational service. This treatment will be repeated for each of the 30 unclassified program designed and built by the Skunk Works. Each program will form a chapter of at least two pages in length, with a maximum of 14 pages being allocated for programs that went into production and merit more detailed coverage, such as the P-80/F-94/T-33 family, C-130 family and, of course, the A-12 and SR-71."
 
Could someone please tell Mr. Goodall that there is an error on his cover? The correct term is "Foreword", not "Forward". Make sure that it is correct inside the book as well. I knew the writer of that Foreword, Jeff Babione, when he was on the F-22 program, before he was promoted and moved to Skunk Works.
 
Unfortunately that seems to be a rather common mistake, seen in other books as well...
Is Mr. Goodall and engineer? that would explain the spelling! ;)
 
Apparently Osprey books is going to publish in February next year Goodall's book entitled "75 Years of the Lockheed Martin Skunk Works." Hardback, 320 pages.

The jacket design is as posted here

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I really hope there will be something more substantial about A-X A/F-X!! Even more considering LM was in 3 on the 5 teams!!
 
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I myself am wondering if Goodall will cover the three 1950s Skunk Work projects that had flown articles that remain classified, and whether he will also review the materials of the 1990s manned reconnaissance vehicles featured in Aviation Week.
 
Some weird SH*T happening with that book... aren't those photos already on the net?
 

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Update:

 
I can understand LM with *photos* but some of RQ-170 images are amateur *renderings*!
 
Jim has his proof copy and posted these on Facebook -
 

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It has been released or not? I pre-ordered it but no news from Amazon...
 
Yep, done some checks... standard post Brexit problems... still unavaible on the continent.
 
Hi All, I wonder why these photographs about the "Senior prom" are classified alhough I've ever seen these some years ago, in another book about Skunkworks or about drones, I don't remember.
 
Xtended Ep.117 – Skunk Works
The aviation podcast "Xtended" invited the author James C. Goodall (USAF Retired) to talk about his latest book ’75 Years of the Lockheed Martin Skunk Works’.
Jim relates his sources for the book, from Area 51 and the Skunk Works, and brings fascinating stories to life.
It hasn’t passed us by that Episode 117 is perfectly appropriate for this subject matter either!
Recorded 20th May 2021

Podcast:
 
Got mine. Did notice a couple of mistakes in the first five minutes. (P&W JTF-17 referred to as a J58 and a HyFly wind tunnel model dropped in as "an early RATTLRS".)
 
Senior PROM photos were passed to Jim without being formally declassified. The declassification can't be completed for some reason. Lockheed Martin could not endorse the book officially if it included these photos, so Jim could either lose the endorsement or lose the photos.

Having it for sale in the Lockheed Martin staff shop (or whatever) is probably worth losing the photos from a financial perspective.
 
Got mine. Did notice a couple of mistakes in the first five minutes. (P&W JTF-17 referred to as a J58 and a HyFly wind tunnel model dropped in as "an early RATTLRS".)
I've seen it and passed on buying it. It's just a lot of photos, the text is minimal could mostly be copy-pasted from wikipedia for its level of insightfulness and few of the pics seemed really interesting or new. I don't like pictorial books in general - I like text to read in my books.
 
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Sometimes when you preorder you get burned. :(
 
Thanks, all, for the warning. I can find better uses for my money than a picture book that tells me little, if anything, new.
 
I will be giving this a miss as I already have two Skunk Works books, Steve Paces Projects of Skunk Works and also Jay Millers book. I do not need yet another book on the subject and especially when it is a picture book.
 
Book review.

I got my copy of Goodall's book late last week. I will not nay-say this book. It's quite good/very good in more aspects than any errors that have been found. RQ-170 features all photos, no renderings (including Iranian photos). Senior Prom does have an entry, but no pics or diagrams of it. Senior Peg likewise lacks illustrative materials.

Sferrin is correct about erroneously using a Hyfly photo for early RATTLRs inlet testing. (That was a Boeing animal, not a Lockheed one.) If anyone can track down an actual RATTLRs inlet test photo, please post it.

Interestingly, Skunk Works was involved in many projects that Lockheed overall worked on, but I wasn't aware that they directly had a hand in. One example is the Cheyenne helicopter of the 1960s, and another is the X-33 Venture Star of the 1990s.

Now Goodall writes that YF-12A project code name wasn't KEDLOCK but KINDLE. That I wasn't aware of. (Paul Crickmore's history volume talks about the name as being KEDLOCK.)

I got my copy via ebay for $52.00 (free shipping), which is lower than the suggested $75 retail cost. It arrived intact, even though the packing box was heavily damaged. (Thanks for nothing, FedEx.) If you want a cheaper copy, it may be advantageous to go the ebay route.

However, as we all know, the book (and every volume that is about Skunk Works that has come before it) remains incomplete. To me, the most important page is the dedication one. Goodall explicitly quotes the late Ben Rich and that paragraph is among the most important of the entire book. (It's about what Skunk Works had been working on "out in the desert.")

I would rate the overall book a 4.3 out of 5 stars. I can say that because of the discount I bought it at. Goodall is definitely the bird that should have written this book. If he gets to read this review, I would encourage him (if he has any fuel left in his imagination tank) to continue to try to crank out other like-topical books.
 
As far as I know, the Skunk Works was not involved in the AH-56 program - it was a helicopter division program. If he includes it as a SW program, why weren't the CL-475 and XH-51 included, as they were precursors?

Also, the YO-3 was a Lockheed Missiles and Space (Sunnyvale) program and followed on from the QT-2 program. The QT-2 is not listed, but the X-26 is listed. The X-26 was a stock Schweizer SGS 2-32, but the QT-2 was developed from it by LM&SC. Many sources say that LM&SC was an offshoot from the SW.

And, the SST was not a SW program. It was mainline Lockheed California.

Lastly, AGM-158 JASSM is not listed and was definitely a SW program.
 
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SST was for sure not Skunk Works. I'm likewise uncertain of AH-56 inclusion and no justification for either of these can be found in the text of the book that I saw.
 
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Of all the aviation authors, I have found Yefim Gordon, Jay Miller, Bob Hopkins, Chris Pocock and the late Bill Gunston to be 100% accurate. Goodall is at best 85% accurate. The odd one out is Tom Cooper. He reports on things that no one else knows about, so its hard to judge his accuracy. Where independent information does come to light, he has proven to be pretty accurate.
 
Of all the aviation authors, I have found Yefim Gordon, Jay Miller, Bob Hopkins, Chris Pocock and the late Bill Gunston to be 100% accurate.
Noone is 100% accurate. Jay Miller Chris Pocock and Bob Hopkins work is very thorough. Bill Gunston, variable, some of his later work is not that great and he relied on his large archive heavily rather than individual per book research. Yefim Gordon, accuracy depends whose books he is plagiarizing but he's made some bad errors.
 

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