World War I German Aviators: The Sanke Cards (Schiffer Military History Book)

For the first time in eighty-five years, the famous Sanke postcards of World War I Imperial German Aviators have been reproduced. Clear, large scale copies of all known and highly collectible Sanke personality photo postcards produced during World War I are now available, carefully replicated, and included all under one cover in this deluxe volume. Over 270 different cards of 132 individual aviators are included in this ground-breaking edition. Boelcke, Immelmann, the Richthofen brothers, Udet, and Göring are just a few of the famed aces and Pour le Mérite flyers photographed by Postkarten-Vertrieb Willi Sanke. Each postcard is given full page coverage, accompanied by a brief history of each man, together with his victories and highest attained award. A bibliography is included for the reader desiring to further research the lives of Germany's unusual, heralded, and greatest heroes of the First War. This book is a must for the student of uniforms as it depicts the amazing variety worn by the flyers of the Luftstreitkräfte 1914-1918, and also shows them wearing the multitude of awards and decorations presented to Germany's airborne heroes. Both private and museum collections have been combed to provide this book with the finest possible coverage ever compiled on the work of Willi Sanke and his talented photographers. This is an excellent companion volume to Schiffer's recently published Aviation Awards of Imperial Germany, Volume VII by the late Neal O'Connor.