Runways and Racers: Sports Car Races Held on Military Airfields in America 1952–1954

by Terry O’Neil

Published a year after O’Neil’s 2010 opus Northeast American Sports Car Races 1950–1959 this new book on a directly related topic is not a sequel but, chronologically speaking, a prequel.

Avanti: Studebaker and Beyond

by John Hull

The marketing blurb for this photo-history book is “spot on” for anyone who is already knowledgeable regarding the marque. On its 94 pages are 120 large, sharp images that permit all the details of the scenes from the decades of Avanti history to be seen clearly. Avanti enthusiasts will enjoy perusing the pages and then studying them again more closely.

The Big Spenders

The Epic Story of the Rich Rich, the Grandees of America and the Magnificoes, and How They Spent Their Fortunes

by Lucius Beebe

Automobile folks couldn’t possibly be ignorant of the Pebble Beach Concours d’Elegance, first held in 1950. In its early days, one name was inseparable from the event: bon vivant and concours judge since 1954 Lucius Morris Beebe.

Brands Hatch: The Definitive History of Britain’s Best-Loved Motor Racing Circuit

by Chas Parker

In declaring to write the “definitive history” Parker set himself an ambitious target. Competition may have been sparse—Brands published several histories decades ago, and Parker himself was between writing a pair of simple guidebooks to racing there.

My First Car

Recollections of First Cars

by Matt Stone

Right out of the box this book looks as if the people making it had a good time! Clever cover art. Smart book jacket blurbs. On the Impressum page even the editor and designers got to list their own first cars. Drum roll, please.

Race to the Sky: The Wright Brothers Versus the United States Government

by Stephen B Goddard

It is positively exciting to think that only three short years lie between the Wrights launching an unmanned kite/glider, then strapping themselves to it, learning by trial and error how to control it, and then, in 1903, achieving mankind’s first powered, controlled, heavier-than-air flight.

Orville’s Aviators: Outstanding Alumni of the Wright Flying School, 1910–1916

by John Carver Edwards

Kitty Hawk is the location that has so lastingly become associated with the Wright brothers’ aviation triumphs but Greene County, Ohio is where most of the actual development and flying—and training—took place.

Hot Rod Model Kits

by Terry Jessee

Being a man of a certain age, this book offers me a sweet and deep sweep of nostalgia; and I won’t be the only one out there. In my early teens, I was captivated and hooked—to be able, with a minimum of skill and patience, to build and customize then current stock cars and modify them into iconic hot rods.

The Space Shuttle Program: How NASA Lost Its Way

by R. Michael Gordon

Even if everyone in the record crowd of 750,000+ that attended NASA’s 135th and final launch in July 2011 had paid $10 admittance, all that money wouldn’t put much of a dent into the $3 billion annual shuttle bill.

Tales from the Toolbox: A Collection of Behind-the-Scenes Tales from Grand Prix Mechanics

by Michael Oliver

A professional motorsports writer, Oliver has great affinity for his subject, as befits someone who was only weeks old when he was taken along to F1 races, and he likes to say that he learned his numbers by looking at the roundels on the side of race cars.

The Car Design Book

by Gautam Sen

It’s not an easy task to sum up in 140 pages the best designs of all times regardless of price and trends! Sen tackled this exercise with total subjectivity and his position as editor of India’s best-selling Auto India magazine certainly didn’t make it easier: the more you know about a subject, the harder it is to make a selection!

Haynes-Apperson and America’s First Practical Automobile: A History

by W.C. Madden

Before you chalk the complex and relatively short-lived motor manufacturing activities of the three separate companies in this family off as ancient or marginal history, consider that one of the technologies it pioneered is in use still today: stellite.