With Many Thanks to Neil Wilson for giving me all this fun stuff to play with! Chuck Yeager originally enlisted in the Army Air Corps as a Private and an Aircraft Mechanic. His age and education prohibited him from any other position at the time. However, the change of U.S. status two months after his enlistment, something to do with an incident in Hawaii, caused the Army to alter their standards for flight training qualifications. Receiving a promotion to 'Flight Officer' and flight training he graduated in March of 1943. He was then assigned to the 357th Fighter Group at Tonopah, Nevada, where he initially trained as a fighter pilot flying P-39 Airacobras (also earning a seven day grounding order for pruning a tree belonging to a local farmer during a training flight), he eventually went overseas with the group in November of 1943. When he was stationed in the United Kingdom at RAF Leiston, Yeager flew P-51 Mustangs in combat (he named his first aircraft Glamorous Glen after his girlfriend, Glennis Faye Dickhouse, who later became his wife) with the 363rd Fighter Squadron. He had one victory before being shot down over France on his eighth mission. Exhibiting nerves of steel he withheld deploying his parachute until the last possible moment to avoid having his whereabouts noted. While working hes way back to England Yeager assisted the guerrillas in the French Underground in duties that did not involve direct combat, though he did help to construct bombs for the group, a skill that he had learned from his father. He was also awarded the Bronze Star for helping another airman escape to England during that period. Fighting his way up the ladder of command (all the way to Ike) to be allowed to return to combat missions, pilots who were shot down and escaped were prohibited from flying over Germany, he was eventually allowed to return to combat. After his return to the 357th in another P51 named Glamorous Glen Yeager had a day in which he claimed 5 enemy aricraft making him an Ace in a Day. Yeager is best remembered, however, for his flight on October 14, 1947 in a Bell X-1 (strangely) named "Glamorous Glennis" in which he was the first man to fly faster than sound. Chuck Retired from the Air Force at the Rank of General in 1975. (Multiple Sources) P51D - NEIWIL (with all the trimmngs) Glamorous Glenn Markings - Me