While writing _Air Power for Peace_, I had been impressed by the need for presenting this point of view in another manner. In the case of sea power, Mahan, the historian, had deduced the lessons of history. But Hakluyt, the author, had helped create the history that Mahan recorded three hundred years later. Born in England, somewhere around 1553, Hakluyt had been depressed by the backwardness of his people. While on a visit to the Temple, his uncle had shown him a map of the world and had given him “a lesson in geography,” which had inspired him to “prosecute that knowledge and kind of literature.” After studying languages so as to be able to read whatsoever printed or written discoveries and voyages he found extant in many lands, he made himself acquainted with the chiefest captains at sea, the greatest merchants, and the best mariners. Hearing other nations extolled for their discoveries and notable enterprises, and depressed by the sluggishness of the English and their neglect of the opportunities afforded them, he undertook to edit the original journals and narratives with a view to showing that in sea power lay the means for abolishing squalor and poverty in England. Today Richard Hakluyt’s _The English Voyages_ is one of the English classics. Having in mind the possibility of utilizing his method for the air-power story, I looked around for material. However, Americans seldom pause to record their observations, as did the explorers and merchants of the pre-Elizabethan era, and I was forced to fall back on my own experience. Fortunately, this had been varied and I had played in the backfield of a number of Bowl games. The air-power story might be told from my own point of view. Decision to undertake this, plus a number of other circumstances, including a visit to a hospital, prompted me to resign from business. In order to approach the task objectively, I found it necessary to detach myself from active operations. Since we had long ago laid the groundwork for bringing a younger generation into the picture, nothing seemed to stand in the way.