Freedom's Forge: How American Business Produced Victory in World War II

This quote form Marin, bought up another great book.

"The only turd I'm aware that Boeing has made was an Army ground attack plane we made in (I think) in the 1920s. It was an armored biplane, and besides being staggering ugly, it could barely get out of its own way it was so heavy. A total flop. We built two of them. They were conceived and designed by the US Army; Boeing simply built them (we needed the money back then). I tried to find a photo on the web but had no success. But it was an absolutley horrible airplane."

That book is,

Freedom's Forge: How American Business Produced Victory in World War II by Arthur Herman

A wonderfully written book, bringing up a whole bunch of facts, i never knew about, for instance do you know how many man days were lost to strikes in 1942?

My first guess, based on the Hollywood history is Zero. I was wrong.

Back to Marin's point about Boeing. It took most of the the newcomers, to manufacturing military equipment (unlike Boeing and the other aircraft makes) about a year to figure out the military had no clue had to design anything.

http://www.amazon.com/Freedoms-Forge-American-Business-Produced/dp/0812982045/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1422384575&sr=8-1&keywords=freedoms%27s+FOrge

THe Navy designed a pair of PT boats prior to WWII. The designs of the two boats were basically the same but one was made of wood and the other was made of aluminum. They were built in the US Navy Yard, and were amazing flops compared to the entries from Elco, Higgins, and Huckins. The aluminum boat, PT-8, still exists, which is a testimony to building a boat out of metal even if the design totally sucks.

Marin
Here's the British wooden version.

Kev