Chuck Yeager grew up in West Virginia and served as a pilot in World War II, shooting down 13.5 enemy planes. In 1947, he broke the sound barrier while piloting the experimental X-1 aircraft. Yeager continued to push the boundaries of aviation, raising the airspeed record and helping to develop experimental planes like the X-15. He established himself as the exemplar of the "right stuff" and helped pave the way for the space program through daring test flights.

1. The Right StuffIII. Yeager

2. That poker-hollow West Virginia drawl“It was the drawl of the most righteous of all the possessors of the right stuff: Chuck Yeager.” (page 34-35)

3. Chuck Yeager started out as the equivalent, in the Second World War, of who in the First World War?Frank Luke of the 27th Aero Squadron

4. Frank LukeAmerican fighter ace, ranking second among U.S. Army Air Service pilots, credited with 18 aerial victories; He was shot in 1918 by a machine gun while flying, he landed his air craft, collapsed from the wound, drew out his pistol and fired a few rounds at approaching German infantry before dying1918

5. Where did Yeager grow up?Hamlin, West Virginia

6. What did Yeager’s father and older brother do for a living?They drilled for natural gas in the coalfields.

7. In 1943, what was Yeager’s rank in the Army Air Force?Flight officer (a non-com who was allowed to fly)

8. How many enemy fighter planes did Yeager shoot down in his first eight missions? 2 German fighters

9. The Right Stuff was a little bit stretched out of shape and Hollywoodized, but I thought the casting was outstanding, and it was fun to watch. Chuck Yeager

10. By the end of World War II, how many kills did Yeager have?13.5 kills

11. Although Yeager was shot down over German-occupied French territory on his ninth mission, how did he manage to return to combat during the Allied invasion of France?He bailed out, was picked up by the French underground and smuggled across the Pyrenees into Spain disguised as a peasant, was jailed briefly in Spain, released, and returned to England

12. Where was Yeager trained as test pilot in 1946 and 1947?Wright Field in Dayton

13. Mojave Desert“The officers stayed in the shacks marked “barracks,” and lesser souls stayed in the tents and froze all night and fried all day.” (page 37)

14. Who discovered that the speed of sound varied at different altitudes, temperatures, and wind speeds?Ernst Mach

15. How did Geoffrey de Havilland die?Son of the famous British aircraft designer and builder, he tried to take one of his father’s DH 108s to Mach 1. The ship started buffeting and then disintegrated, and he was killed.

16. What was Pancho Barnes’s maiden name?Florence Leontine Lowe

17. Who was Pancho Barnes’s grandfather?Thaddeus S.C. Lowe, the designer of the old Mount Lowe cable-car system

18. Thaddeus S.C. LoweFought in First Bull Run under Gen. Irvin McDowell , formed the Union Army Balloon Corps , served in the Army of Potomac under McClellan, participated in the Peninsula Campaign of 1862, made observations over Mechanicsville, VA, the Balloon Corps became the Engineers CorpProf. Thaddeus Lowe observing the Battle of Seven Pines or Fair Oaks from his balloon "Intrepid" 1918

19. Where did Pancho Barnes grow up?San Marino, which adjoined Pasadena and was one of LA’s wealthiest suburbs

20. How many times was Pancho Barnes married?4

21. How did Pancho Barnes get the nickname “Pancho”?In the late 1920’s, by boat and plane, she ran guns for Mexican revolutionaries

22. In 1930, whose airspeed record for women did she break?Amelia Earhart’s

23. Who was Pancho Barnes’ first husband?Rev. C. Rankin Barnes, the pastor of the Pasadena Episcopal Church

24. The Air Force was using which aircraft to break the sound barrier?The Bell X-1

25. The prime pilot for the X-1 looked like a pilot from out of Hell’s Angels. What was his name?Slick Goodlin

26. October 14, 1947“Not being an engineer, Yeager didn’t believe the “barrier” existed.” (page 40)

27. What was the name of Chuck’s wife?Glennis

28. Where did Chuck have the inscription “Glamorous Glennis”?On the nose of his P-51 and the X-1

29. Two days before Yeager is scheduled to break the sound barrier, how does he manage to break two ribs?He and his horse hit a gate during a midnight horse ride, and he flies off and lands on his right side.

30. What was the fuel for the X-1 called?Lox (alcohol and liquid oxygen)

31. How much fuel can the X-1 hold?2.5 minutes worth

32. Who was Yeager’s flight engineer?Jack RidleyChuck Yeager and Jack Ridley next to the X-1 and its B-29 mother plane

33. Screwy machometer “… Yeager’s deadpan way of announcing that the X-1’s instrument indicated Mach 1.” (page 45)

34. When did the Air Force decide to publicize Chuck Yeager’s achievement?June 1948, almost a year after the occasion

35. Breaking the Sound Barrier was a British movie, released in 1952, inspired by who?Geoffrey de Havilland

36. How did people, including the Secretary of the Air Force, think Chuck Yeager broke the sound barrier?By reversing the controls

37. Muroc Army Air Base became Edwards Air Force Base in 1947. The base was named after who and how did this man die?Glen Edwards died testing a ship with no tail called the Flying Wing

38. What does NACA stand for?National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics

39. Who raised the speed record to Mach 2?Scott Crossfield

40. Who raised the speed record to Mach 2.4 in an X-1A?Chuck Yeagerage 25, 1949

41. NACA and the Air Force built the X-15 to start a new project. What was the goal of this project?To probe altitudes as high as fifty miles, which was well beyond anything that could be called “air”

42. Who did Yeager help land the Douglas Skyrocket?Bill Bridgeman, the prime pilot for the Douglas Skyrocket

43. What “very un-Yeager like thing” did Yeager do to help a pilot who was suffering from hypoxia?He yelled into the microphone to penetrate the man’s impacted hypoxic skull. Jackie Cochran in the cockpit of the Canadair Sabre with Chuck Yeager.

44. What was Yeager’s signature?A F-86 sixty that slow rolled 60 feet off the deck

45. What happened October 4, 1957?The Soviet Union launched Sputnik I into orbit around the Earth

46. Where and what was Chuck Yeager on October 4, 1957?At George Air Force Base, about fifty miles southeast of Edwards, commanding a squadron of F-100s

47. Who was trained to fly the X-15?Scott Crossfield

48. Who came up for the proposal for the X-15B project?Harrison Stormswatching the X-15 plane's first powered climb into the sky

49. The Soviet Union developed an atomic bomb in what year?1953

50. Who said, “The Roman Empire controlled the world because it could build roads. Later – when it moved to sea – the British Empire was dominant because it had ships. In the air age we were powerful because we had airplanes. Now the Communists have established a foothold in outer space.”?Lyndon Johnson

51. Who was head of the House Select Committee of Astronautics?John McCormack

52. Spam in a can“…very popular at Edwards as the nickname for Project Mercury.” (page 60)

53. Who said “It cannot be overemphasized that the survival of the free world – indeed, all the world – is caught up in the stakes.” ?John McCormack

54. Who is the author of We?Yevgeny Zamyatin

55. Who emerged as the new Stalin in terms of his autocratic rule of the Soviet Union?Nikita Khrushchev

56. Who came up with the capsule approach? Brigadier General Don Flickinger

57. What does MISS stand for?Man in space soonest

58. How tall did a man have to be for Project Mercury?Five feet eleven

59. What was the age requirement for Project Mercury?No older than thirty-nine

60. Who were the prime pilots for the X-15 project?Scott Crossfield, Joe Walker, Iven Kincheloe

61. According to the author, who did the Air Force envision as the new Yeager?Iven Kincheloe

62. What record did Iven Kincheloe set?He set the world altitude record of 126,000 feet in the X-2

63. How was Iven Kincheloe killed?He tried ejecting from an F-104 but he went out sideways and was killed

64. Who was Iven Kincheloe’s backup for the X-15 project?Robert Michael Whitein the cockpit of an X-15 rocket plane at Edwards Air Force Base, Calif. He became the first pilot to exceed Mach 4, 5 and 6 in the X-15 in 1961. On July 17, 1962, he became the first to fly it in space.

65. Who was Joe Walker’s backup for the X-15 project?Neil Armstrong, a former Navy fighter pilot