Conversely, from 1970 or so, it was almost impossible not to". it seems that up until 1960 or so, it was quite rare to call Richthofen the Red Baron. As Brett Holman's fascinating post When was the Red Baron? puts it ". He held the title of Freiherr, that can roughly be translated as "Baron", and the nickname The Red Baron wasn't entirely unknown, but his own autobiography Der Rote Kampfflieger was, slightly clunkily, more directly translated as "The Red Battle Flyer", and 1930s biographies preferred The Red Knight. Of course Manfred von Richthofen did exist, and flew bright red aircraft (most famously a Fokker Triplane). Curiously, if you look at a Google Ngram it's only in 1965 that the name takes off (if you'll forgive the pun). In popular culture, though, the Red Baron reigns supreme (I'm not aware of another flier with a pizza brand, variety of onion, and Top 10 single named after them). It's hardly scientific, but a cursory search of "Ace" in the Waterstones History section turns up 251 results (though skewed a bit by Panzer Aces, Sniper Aces, U-boat Aces and guides to Ace Your Collage Exams), including Fighter Ace, Gunship Ace, An Ace of the Eighth, Spitfire Ace, The First Hellcat Ace etc etc. In popular history there's certainly no lack of interest in ace pilots from any era. By the end of the war many pilots were household names, Manfred von Richthofen's total of 80 victories putting him at the top of the list over René Fonck and Billy Bishop.ĭuring the Second World War aviators were also celebrated by all sides, Germany had a host of Aces or "Experten" with incredibly high scores, the British were again reticent to promote individuals (see What were the award criteria for WW2 British figher pilots? for some more detail) but some became known by name such as John "Cat's Eyes" Cunningham (in connection with the story about carrots being good for night vision) and Douglas Bader who lost his legs in 1931 but went on to become an ace. The British were more reticent to publicise individuals, but relented to some extent towards the end of 1916. But Miss Sherwin has no access to the order of battle maps, and so if she is to think about the war, she fastens upon Joffre and the Kaiser as if they were engaged in a personal duel." A similar personal duel between pilots could be presented to the public (even if not a particularly accurate depiction of much air warfare) from 1915 German and French pilots were celebrated in the press, Max Immelmann and Oswald Boelcke being awarded the Pour le Mérite decoration for their (at the time) unprecedented eight victories, and the concept of the 'Ace' as a pilot with five or more victories began. They think of them as, say, two hundred divisions. No one, in fact, can imagine them, and the professionals do not try. Pictures of French and German soldiers she has seen, but it is impossible for her to imagine three million men. She has never been to France, and certainly she has never been along what is now the battlefront. Robertson's The Dream of Civilized Warfare: World War I Flying Aces and the American Imagination is very good on the subject, mentioning Walter Lippmann's 1922 essay Public Opinion: "Miss Sherwin of Gopher Prairie is aware that a war is raging in France and tries to conceive it. The ability to identify individuals was also in stark contrast to the scale and brutality of the ground war that was hard to comprehend Linda R. As you say, aviation was novel and pre-war feats such as Blériot's flight across the English Channel drew considerable press attention, the mere act of flying was dangerous enough even before adding other people trying to kill you. To wind back a bit, pilots in the First World War were celebrated for various reasons. Though the question is perhaps slightly different I'm not sure the premise entirely holds of First World War pilots in general being more esteemed than those of later conflicts, the Red Baron is something of a unique case and didn't actually exist until the 1960s.
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