“Wow!” Panda exclaimed. “It looks like Mom got some new books!”

Panda and I were at the Christian school library waiting for Mom to finish working on her latest blog post. We were getting bored, so we decided to look at all the books. Panda managed to jump up to the bottom shelf and was looking at the biographies.

” I think I can get up on this shelf,” Panda said as he hoisted himself up with his arms. “I want to see these books about Chuck Yeager.” I was curious, but then that’s not unusual for a cat. “Why?” I asked, to which Panda responded that he had been listening to one of the services on our church website, and our pastor had talked about him. “Pastor was saying that we need to be persistent and press forward if we want a spiritual breakthrough, just like Chuck Yeager pressed forward to break the sound barrier. It was an awesome message.”

“I can imagine,” I said. “He is an amazing preacher. Hey – what are you doing?” Panda was poised on the biographies shelf, just getting ready to pull out one of the Chuck Yeager books. “Don’t touch anything! Remember what happened when we went on Amazon Prime!”

But it was too late! Before we knew it, we were spiraling into the bookshelf!

Imagine our surprise when we landed right next to two men by a plane called the “Glamorous Glennis”! One of the men looked down and noticed us at his feet. “Hey, Jack, look at this,” he said to his friend. “Where did these guys come from?” The other man looked thoughtful. “There’s no telling,” he said. “But you know we aren’t that far from Area 51.”

It took us a minute to gain our bearings, but we quickly realized where we were. It was October 14, 1947, and we were at what is now Edwards Airforce Base, standing next to the famous pilot Chuck Yeager and his friend, Jack Ridley. Everything was black and white, including us! We had always wondered if everything was black and white in those days, and now we knew. Immediately we introduced ourselves. “We don’t mind telling you, Captain Yeager,” Panda said sincerely, “that it’s a great honor to meet you!” The captain seemed pleased, “Thanks,” he replied. “Would you boys like to see some of our planes?”

We replied that we would be delighted. We followed Captain Yeager across the runway where we saw what we recognized as a Bell X-1 aircraft. “Wow!” Panda exclaimed, as we jumped in to get a better look. “Is this the plane you’re going to use to break the sound barrier?” Our new friend looked at us quizzically and replied that he was going to try it later on that day, but he was going to use a different Bell X-1. “The one I’m going to fly is the Glamorous Glennis,” he explained. “It’s named after my wife. Whenever I’ve flown a plane that was named after her, I’ve come back safely.” We nodded thoughtfully. “That’s the one you were standing in front of when we got here, right?” I asked. The captain replied in the affirmative. “Yes,” he said. “If any plane can break the sound barrier, it’s the Glamorous Glennis!”

As we followed Captain Yeager through the airport, we saw a lot of amazing planes that had been used in World War Two. We didn’t know much about World War Two, but we knew Mom’s grandfathers had been in World War One. “There were a lot of different planes used in the war,” our new friend explained. “Each of them had different characteristics based on what their jobs were. This one was flown by Lieutenant Charles C. Pattillo. He and his identical twin brother, Bill, are both fighter pilots. Bill was shot down over Germany in April of 1945 and was a POW for about five months until the war ended.” We were amazed. “Who ever thought there would be identical twin fighter pilots?” Panda mused. “I never heard of them before.”

“This is a biplane,” Captain Yeager explained when we got to the next aircraft. “They are called that because they have two sets of wings. They were mostly used during the first world war. When this latest war started, in 1939, there were only a few in use. By then they were used mostly for training purposes.” Panda jumped up into the cockpit, exclaiming, “Wow, I could probably fly this!” I was ready for that one. “I’m sure you could,” I replied calmly, “but get down from there before you get hurt.” Captain Yeager looked puzzled. “We have flown a plane before,” I explained, “and Panda has his jeep driving license from basic training. That’s probably why he thinks he can fly this one.”

“Where did you fly a plane?” our friend asked curiously, as he helped us climb up onto another plane so we could see the controls. “It was in Area 51,” I replied modestly. “It was our first time flying a plane, and it wasn’t really that hard. To be honest, we had to borrow it without permission to get back to Fresno.” The captain nodded, rubbing his chin. “Well, that’s. . . interesting,” he said, more to himself than to us. Then, looking at his watch, he announced it was time to go back to the Glamorous Glennis. “I’ll be taking off in a few minutes,” he said.

“Can we go too?” Panda asked eagerly, as we arrived back at the plane. “It would be so cool to break the sound barrier with you!” Captain Yeager looked doubtful. “I haven’t broken it yet,” he said. “I’m not sure I should be taking passengers up. You know there is always an element of risk.” Panda and I were not going to take “No” for an answer. “We’ll be fine,” I said encouragingly. “This time you’re going to make it!” The captain shook his head and chuckled kindly. “Now how would you guys know that?” he asked. Panda opened his mouth to say something but changed his mind. “We just have confidence in you,” he said cheerfully. After a bit more persuading, we managed to convince him to let us go with him.

“Okay men,” Captain Yeager said at last. “Let’s go.” We climbed into the Glamorous Glennis and buckled our seatbelts. Before we knew it, we were flying through the air faster and higher than we had ever gone before. “The speed of sound, or Mach 1, is over 760 miles per hour,” the captain explained. “Get ready, because the closer we get, the more the plane is going to shake and rattle. That’s one reason nobody has passed the speed of sound yet. The controls go haywire, and we don’t know what will happen next. We’ve had to abort the mission multiple times.”

Suddenly the Glamorous Glennis began to shake wildly. The dials on the instrument panel began to rotate out of control. “This is it,” Captain Yeager said, grabbing the steering wheel. “Hope we can make it!” Panda and I held on to our seats for dear life. “We’ll make it!” we exclaimed in unison. Then, amazingly, everything became calm, and we were gliding through the air just like nothing had happened. It wasn’t until we landed that the captain realized we had broken the sound barrier. The men on the ground ran up to us, cheering and slapping him on the back. “Woo-hoo!” we shouted joyfully, giving the captain high fives. “We made it!”

Everyone was still congratulating each other when we realized something was happening. Panda and I were spiraling back into the library through one of the Chuck Yeager books!

We landed right in front of the shelf where Mom keeps our adventure stories for the kids to check out. “That’s cool,” Panda said. “She even put our names on the shelf.” Then he added, “Hey, wasn’t it fun going back in time?” I agreed that it was. Since Mom was still working on her laptop, we decided to look around some more.

Soon we found a shelf we had never seen before. “What books are these?” Panda asked, climbing up for a better look. It was then that I read the label on the shelf. It said, “A Blast From the Past.” They were vintage books from all the way back to before Mom was born! Panda reached up to get one off the shelf, just as I was saying, “Don’t touch any–“

__________________

Note From Foster: The photos of Chuck Yeager and the Glamorous Glennis are taken from various websites Mom found while searching the internet. Other photos are from Unsplash, a royalty-free photography site. The library pictures are from our school library. We’d like to thank Grant for giving Mom the idea for this story. Besides the informational links already in the story, here are some other sites where Mom got her photos and information:

Photo of the Glamorous Glennis controls

National WW2 Museum

Chuck Yeager.org

Supersonic Speed, Wikipedia