The German rigid airship Hindenburg on its final flight. Views of the airship flying over Manhattan Island, New York City. Swastika symbol visible on the airship's tail section. The airship descending for landing at Lakehurst Naval Air Station in New Jersey. Views of the passengers in the windows waving to the onlookers on the ground. Explosion and massive fire and smoke consumes the airship. It crashes to the ground in flames and collapses. Rescuers in the foreground run toward the burning wreckage.
Documentary tilted 'History of Aviation' depicts benefits to mankind brought by discovery of aviation. A group of travelers on horses and bullock carts, in hot and dusty deserts travels from California to New York. A railroad train runs on railroad between California and New York. Howard Hughes' Lockheed 14 Super Electra Special, Model 14-N2 ( NX18973) seen in aerial views over Manhattan Island, New York City, with New York City skyline and skyscrapers visible. (scene filmed on July 14, 1938). Animated map shows ship sail towards Europe. Brief, distant view of a tall mast traditional sailing ship at sea with full sails deployed. A more modern passenger cruise ship or ocean liner with four large stacks underway in the ocean towards Europe. Howard Hughes airplane takes off in New York, bound for Paris, France.
Film opens with views of goosestepping German, Italian, and Japanese soldiers during parade reviews in their respective countries. Emperor Hirohito, on a white horse. American battleships burning in the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. U.S. General Douglas MacArthur decorating a soldier in Manila, Philippines. Air raid sirens sounding in Manila and residents hurrying to take cover. Heavy black smoke rising from a bombed site and emergency vehicles responding and rushing to several bombed and burning locations. A burning rickshaw amidst other bombing rubble and bodies of victims. U.S. Army General MacArthur greeted by Australian officials at his headquarters in Brisbane, Australia. Sign reads: Headquarters UNITED STATES ARMY FORCES in Australia. American flag flying on tall flagpole. View from ship underway in supply convoy. A battleship seen on horizon and a destroyer passing the camera ship. U.S. President, Franklin D. Roosevelt signing the "Lend Lease Act" of 1941. A U.S. industrial plant with four tall stacks emitting smoke. A steam locomotive belching steam. A locomotive pulling an open car and some tank cars. New 1941 Plymouth automobiles coming off a production line. A new M3 Medium Tank in a U.S. factory. View of Liberty Ships, including the "Zebulon Pike" and the "Henry Knox" under construction at the California Shipbuilding Corporation yard, Terminal Island, California. U.S. Navy Destroyers constructed at Federal Shipbuilding & Dry Dock Company, Kearny, New Jersey. One is being launched, next to DD-446 (the USS Radford). A formation of U.S. Navy aircraft including Curtiss SBC Helldiver scout bombers and Douglas TBD Devastator torpedo bombers. A tight formation of U.S. Army Douglas B-18 Bolo medium bombers in flight. A formation of U.S. Army Curtiss P-36 Hawk aircraft in flight. Closeup of a U.S. Army Lockheed P-38 Lightning aircraft in flight. Several huge gun barrels for guns under construction at a U.S. war plant. Large artillery shells lined up in a manufacturing plant. U.S. Army M3 Medium tanks under construction at a factory. Steam and smoke rising from a U.S. industrial plant. Aerial view of open pit iron mine. Sparks shooting up inside a steel plant. A virtual "forest" of oil derricks in the Western U.S. Coal being transported by railway. View from stern of a warship in a convoy. An Atlanta-class light cruiser leading three destroyers at sea. Transport ships in convoys to places like Australia, Britain, and the Middle East. Troops on a pier near a large transport ship. A stack of wartime supplies on a pier next to a ship destined for Russia. Glimpse of wake from a U.S. warship having triple guns astern. Silhouette of a U.S. Navy Enterprise-class Aircraft carrier, with an aircraft taking off from her deck. The aircraft carrier, USS Saratoga. U.S. Army soldiers marching on parade, followed by numerous jeeps with machine guns mounted in their rears. Young men being drafted into the U.S. military. A draft lottery being conducted. New recruits doing calisthenics. Trucks pulling artillery pieces. B-18 Bolo bombers flying over U.S. tanks. Closeup of M3 tank. Cavalry fording a stream. Soldiers on motorcycles. Troops crossing a pontoon bridge. A loaded troop ship. A troop transport at Newfoundland. Sentry in Trinidad. Troops encamped in Bermuda.Troopship docked in Greenland. Troops disembarking in Iceland. Formations of Curtis P-36 Hawk aircraft. Douglas DC-2 aircraft factory. P-36s with engines running. M3 tank suspended on factory crane. Officials of Pan American nations siding with Allies. Allied troops including Dutch, Belgian, Yugoslav, Greek, Czech, Filipino, Polish, Norwegian, Free French, Australian, New Zealand, South African and Canadian. British warships. British Hawker Tempest aircraft. British commandos. Russian troops on parade. Chinese troops on the Great Wall of China.
Exterior view of Pan American Union Building in Washington DC, with a 1930s Packard four door sedan-limousine parked in front. A man entering the building. Jefferson Caffery, U.S. Ambassador to Brazil, seated in an office and reviewing paperwork. Narrator describes the creation of the Good Neighbor Fleet (where Moore-McCormack Lines, also called Mooremack, was contracted to run three ocean liners of the U.S. Maritime Commission between the USA and South America, called the Good Neighbor Fleet.) Close up picture of brochure advertising the new fleet, and picturing the three ships (The California, Virginia and Pennsylvania from the former Panama Pacific Line, with new names Uruguay, Brazil and Argentina.) Next scene shows 3 men meeting (this is possibly Moore-McCormack Lines founder Albert V. Moore, on right, seated at a table and in discussion, possibly with U.S. Maritime officials. Man on left is possibly Emmet McCormack.) Passengers aboard liner SS Brazil as it departs port. Crowd on docks wave at the ship leaving New York harbor. View from on board SS Brazil in New York Harbor as a nearby tug boat sprays water. Skyline and skyscrapers of New York City's Manhattan Island seen in background. Map of South America showing route of a Good Neighbor ship. Good Neighbor Fleet ships at a harbor in South America. U.S. State Department diplomats in South America beside one of the ships as fleet service is inaugurated. Exterior view of Pan American Union building and its sign in Washington DC (later called the building of the Organization of American States). President Ortiz of Argentina, President Alfredo Baldomir of Uruguay, and President Getulio Vargas of Brazil are shown in discussion with various officials.
Director of the U.S Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), J.Edgar Hoover, addresses Americans in military service in 1940. He speaks about enemy agents sent to the United States to undermine the war effort. Scene shifts to a 1940 nighttime view of New York City with lights on in its buildings. Sound of Benny Goodman's orchestra in background. Glimpse of water displays at the New York World's Fair. Brooklyn Dodgers Baseball team playing a game at Ebbets Field. A large field of wheat being harvested by a mechanical reaper, in an American western state. American soldiers putting on civilian clothes for weekend passes. Views of various American cities and towns with cars driving on parkways, shoppers and pedestrians walking in business districts. Closeup of a German agent, ostensibly being apprehended while beaming information to Germany via shortwave radio. German documents are on his desk. A submarine periscope tracks across surface of water. A torpedo races through the water leaving a trail of bubbles. An American ship, ostensibly being torpedoed in the Caribbean. Letters being mailed to so-called "mail drops" in Spain and South America. An intercepted letter with military information being highlighted. A brick house, outside Los Angeles, where an unidentified man is seen, whom narrator (J.Edgar Hoover) describes as " This self-appointed Dictator, who set himself up in the business of promoting Nazism." A picture of Adolf Hitler is seen on his wall. Near Chicago, a wooden sign reads, "Camp Hindenburg., Two miles." American Nazi youth are seen parading there. A newspaper shows a picture of Nazi youth at Camp Nordland, in New Jersey where young American Nazi girls are seen parading. In Yaphank, on long Island, New York, American Nazis are seen parading. The head of the German-American Bund, Fritz Kuhn, is seen at an outdoor podium giving a speech, while surrounded and guarded by uniformed Bund members. He is enthusiastically applauded by members of the audience. Several women with babies in carriages, cross at a corner in New York City. Some receive notices being passed out by a young man, announcing a "Mass Demonstration for true Americans" (to be held at Madison Square Garden). A swastika appears on each notice. View from a high point overlooking a crowd of 22 thousand American Nazis gathered in Madison Square Garden, on Feb. 20, 1939. An honor guard parades as drummers play from the stage. A mass of men holding American flags, and one holding a banner showing a swastika and words in German. Audience members all render the Nazi salute and shout "Heil." Files in the FBI offices labeled "German Agents." The file of Walter Kappe, one of the leaders of the Chicago Free Society of Teutonia and German American Bund is shown. Narrator, Hoover, says, " he was a Lieutenant in the German Army and the Leader of German sabotage in the United States." View of a vast array of desks and files in the FBI where men and women work on fingerprints. A man projects fingerprints on a screen, as Hoover speaks of the files revealing that "innocent appearing persons, applying for work in United States war plants, had been convicted of espionage in the last world war."Two men look over an FBI chart showing the location of every key spy and mail drop in North and South America
U.S.Army Air Service flying expedition to Alaska and back. DH-4B aircraft of the Black Wolf Squadron preparing to depart Mitchel Field, Long Island, New York, on their record-breaking flight to Nome, Alaska, and return. Change of scene to Alaska. Captain St. Clair Streett and other members of the expedition posing next to the DH-4B flown by 2nd Lieutenant C.H. Crumrine. An itinerary of their flight on the fuselage of the airplane. Two aircrew hold pet dogs.
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