About this item
The quest for the land speed record in the 1960s and the epic rivalry between two dynamic American drivers, Art Arfons and Craig Breedlove. "Interesting and complex. . . .The best job I've seen done on the subject so far." -- Craig Breedlove Until the 1950s, the land speed record (LSR) was held by a series of European gentlemen racers such as British driver John Cobb, who hit 394 miles per hour in 1947. That record held for more than a decade, until the car culture swept the U.S. Hot-rodders and drag racers built and souped up racers using car engines, piston aircraft engines and, eventually, jet engines. For this determined and dedicated group, the LSR was no longer an honor to be held by rich aristocrats with industrial backing -- it was brought stateside.
About the Author
Samuel Hawley has BA and MA degrees in history from Queen's University in Kingston, Ontario and worked in East Asia as a teacher for two decades before becoming a full-time writer. His nonfiction books include "The Imjin War," about Japan's 16th-century invasion of Korea and attempted conquest of China, first published in 2005 and reissued in 2014 (Chinese translation forthcoming) ; "Speed Duel: The Inside Story of the Land Speed Record in the Sixties," now being developed by Company Pictures into a TV miniseries; and "I Just Ran: Percy Williams, World's Fastest Human," named one of the five "Best Sports Books of 2011" by the CBC (Canadian Broadcasting Corporation) . Hawley has also written fiction, starting with the novel "Bad Elephant Far Stream" and continuing with the thriller "Homeowner With a Gun," now in development as a feature film. In his latest book, "The Fight That Started the Movies," Hawley returns to nonfiction to tell the epic story of how the world's first feature-length film came to be made.
