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Convair B-36 Peacemaker

The Convair B-36 "Peacemaker" is a strategic bomber that was built by Convair and operated by the United States Air Force (USAF) from 1949 to 1959. The B-36 is the largest mass-produced piston-engined aircraft ever built. It has the longest wingspan of any combat aircraft ever built, at 230 ft. The B-36 was the first bomber capable of delivering any of the nuclear weapons in the U.S. arsenal from an internal bomb bay without aircraft modifications. With a range of 10000 mi and a maximum payload of 87200 lb, the B-36 is capable of intercontinental flight without refueling.

Entering service in 1948, the B-36 was the primary nuclear weapons delivery vehicle of Strategic Air Command (SAC) until it was replaced by the jet-powered Boeing B-52 Stratofortress beginning in 1955. All but four aircraft have been scrapped.

Development
The genesis of the B-36 can be traced to early 1941, prior to the entry of the United States into World War II. At the time, the threat existed that Britain might fall to the German "Blitz", making a strategic bombing effort by the United States Army Air Corps (USAAC) against Germany impossible with the aircraft of the time.

The United States would need a new class of bomber that would reach Europe and return to bases in North America, necessitating a combat range of at least 5700 mi, the length of a Gander, Newfoundland–Berlin round trip. The USAAC therefore sought a bomber of truly intercontinental range, similar to the German Reichsluftfahrtministerium's (RLM) ultralong-range Amerikabomber program, the subject of a 33-page proposal submitted to Reichsmarschall Hermann Göring on 12 May 1942.

The USAAC sent out the initial request on 11 April 1941, asking for a 450 mph top speed, a 275 mph cruising speed, a service ceiling of 45000 ft—beyond the range of ground-based anti-aircraft fire—and a maximum range of 12000 mi at 25000 ft. These requirements proved too demanding for any short-term design, far exceeding the technology of the day, so on 19 August 1941, they were reduced to a maximum range of 10000 mi, an effective combat radius of 4000 mi with a 10000 lb bombload, a cruising speed between 240 and 300 mph, and a service ceiling of 40000 ft —above the maximum effective altitude of Nazi Germany's anti-aircraft guns, save for the rarely-deployed 12.8 cm FlaK 40 heavy flak cannon.

World War II and after
As the Pacific war progressed, the USAAF increasingly needed a bomber capable of reaching Japan from its bases in Hawaii, and the development of the B-36 resumed in earnest. Secretary of War Henry L. Stimson, in discussions with high-ranking officers of the USAAF, decided to waive normal army procurement procedures, and on 23 July 1943—some 15 months after the Germans' Amerikabomber proposal's submission made it to their RLM authority, and coincidentally, the same day that, in Germany, the RLM had ordered the Heinkel firm to design a six-engined version of their own, BMW 801E powered Amerikabomber design proposal —the USAAF submitted a "letter of intent" to Convair, ordering an initial production run of 100 B-36s before the completion and testing of the two prototypes. The first delivery was due in August 1945, and the last in October 1946, but Consolidated (by this time renamed Convair after its 1943 merger with Vultee Aircraft) delayed delivery. The aircraft was unveiled on 20 August 1945 (three months after V-E Day), and flew for the first time on 8 August 1946.

After the establishment of an independent United States Air Force in 1947, the beginning in earnest of the Cold War with the 1948 Berlin Airlift, and the 1949 atmospheric test of the first Soviet atomic bomb, American military planners sought bombers capable of delivering the very large and heavy first-generation atomic bombs.

The B-36 was the only American aircraft with the range and payload to carry such bombs from airfields on American soil to targets in the USSR. The modification to allow the use of larger atomic weapons on the B-36 was called the "Grand Slam Installation".

The B-36 was arguably obsolete from the outset, being piston-powered, coupled with the widespread introduction of first-generation jet fighters in potential enemy air forces. However, its jet rival, the Boeing B-47 Stratojet, which did not become fully operational until 1953, lacked the range to attack the Soviet homeland from North America without aerial refueling and could not carry the huge first-generation Mark 16 hydrogen bomb.

The other American piston bombers of the day, the B-29 and B-50, were also too limited in range to be part of America's developing nuclear arsenal. Intercontinental ballistic missiles did not become sufficiently reliable until the early 1960s. Until the Boeing B-52 Stratofortress became operational in 1955, the B-36, as the only truly intercontinental bomber, continued to be the primary nuclear weapons delivery vehicle of the SAC.

Convair touted the B-36 as the "aluminum overcast", a so-called "long rifle" giving SAC truly global reach. During General Curtis LeMay's tenure as head of SAC (1949–57), the B-36, through intense crew training and development, formed the heart of the Strategic Air Command. Its maximum payload was more than four times that of the B-29, and exceeded that of the B-52.

The B-36 was slow and could not refuel in midair, but could fly missions to targets 3400 mi away and stay aloft as long as 40 hours. Moreover, the B-36 was believed to have "an ace up its sleeve": a phenomenal cruising altitude for a piston-driven aircraft, made possible by its huge wing area and six 28-cylinder engines, putting it out of range of most of the interceptors of the day, as well as ground-based anti-aircraft guns.

Experimentals and prototypes
Consolidated Vultee Aircraft Corporation (later Convair) and Boeing Aircraft Company took part in the competition, with Consolidated winning a tender on 16 October 1941. Consolidated asked for a $15 million contract with $800,000 for research and development, mockup, and tooling. Two experimental bombers were proposed, the first to be delivered in 30 months, and the second within another six months. Originally designated Model B-35, the name was changed to B-36 to avoid confusion with the Northrop YB-35 piston-engined flying-wing bomber, against which the B-36 was meant to compete for a production contract.

Throughout its development, the B-36 program encountered delays. When the United States entered World War II, Consolidated was ordered to slow B-36 development and greatly increase Consolidated B-24 Liberator production. The first mockup was inspected on 20 July 1942, following six months of refinements. A month after the inspection, the project was moved from San Diego, California, to Fort Worth, Texas, which set back development several months. Consolidated changed the tail from a twin-tail to a single, thereby saving 3850 lb, but this change delayed delivery by 120 days.

Changes in the USAAF requirements did add back any weight saved in redesigns, and cost more time. A new antenna system needed to be designed to accommodate an ordered radio and radar system. The Pratt and Whitney engines were redesigned, adding another 1000 lb.

Design

The B-36 took shape as an aircraft of immense proportions. It was two-thirds longer than the previous "superbomber", the B-29. The wingspan and tail height of the B-36 exceeded those of the 1960s Soviet Union's Antonov An-22, the largest ever turboprop-driven aircraft put into production. Only with the advent of the Boeing 747 and the Lockheed C-5 Galaxy, both designed two decades later, did American aircraft capable of lifting a heavier payload become commonplace.

The wings of the B-36 were large even when compared with present-day aircraft, exceeding, for example, those of the C-5 Galaxy, and enabled the B-36 to carry enough fuel to fly the intended long missions without refueling. The maximum thickness of the wing, measured perpendicular to the chord, was 7.5 ft, containing a crawlspace that allowed access to the engines. The wing area permitted cruising altitudes well above the operating ceiling of any 1940s-era operational piston and jet-turbine fighters. Most versions of the B-36 could cruise at over 40000 ft. In 1954, the turrets and other nonessential equipment were removed (not unlike the earlier Silverplate program for the atomic bomb-carrying "specialist" B-29s), resulting in a "featherweight" configuration believed to have resulted in a top speed of 423 mph, and cruise at 50000 ft and dash at over 55000 ft, perhaps even higher.

The large wing area and the option of starting the four jet engines supplementing the piston engines in later versions gave the B-36 a wide margin between stall speed (VS) and maximum speed (Vmax) at these altitudes. This made the B-36 more maneuverable at high altitude than the USAF jet interceptors of the day, which either could not fly above 40000 ft, or if they did, were likely to stall out when trying to maneuver or fire their guns. However, the U.S. Navy argued that their McDonnell F2H Banshee fighter could intercept the B-36, thanks to its ability to operate at more than 50000 ft. The USAF declined the invitation from the U.S. Navy for a fly-off between the Banshee and the B-36. Later, the new Secretary of Defense, Louis A. Johnson, who considered the U.S. Navy and naval aviation essentially obsolete in favor of the USAF and SAC, forbade putting the Navy's claim to the test.

The propulsion system of the B-36 was unique, with six 28-cylinder Pratt & Whitney R-4360 Wasp Major radial engines mounted in an unusual pusher configuration, rather than the conventional four-engine, tractor propeller layout of other heavy bombers. The prototype R-4360s delivered a total of 18000 hp. While early B-36s required long takeoff runs, this situation was improved with later versions, delivering a significantly increased power output of 22800 hp total. Each engine drove a three-bladed propeller, 19 ft in diameter, mounted in the pusher configuration, thought to be the second-largest diameter propeller design ever used to power a piston-engined aircraft (after that of the Linke-Hofmann R.II). This unusual configuration prevented propeller turbulence from interfering with airflow over the wing, but could also lead to engine overheating due to insufficient airflow around the engines, resulting in inflight engine fires.

The large, slow-turning propellers interacted with the high-pressure airflow behind the wings to produce an easily recognizable very-low-frequency pulse at ground level that betrayed approaching flights.

Addition of jet propulsion
Beginning with the B-36D, Convair added a pair of General Electric J47-19 jet engines suspended near the end of each wing; these were also retrofitted to all extant B-36Bs. Consequently, the B-36 was configured to have 10 engines, six radial propeller engines and four jet engines, leading to the B-36 slogan of "six turnin' and four burnin. The B-36 had more engines than any other mass-produced aircraft. The jet pods greatly improved takeoff performance and dash speed over the target. In normal cruising flight, the jet engines were shut down to conserve fuel. When the jet engines were shut down, louvers closed off the front of the pods to reduce drag and to prevent ingestion of sand and dirt. The jet engine louvers were opened and closed by the flight crew in the cockpit, whether the B-36 was on the ground or in the air. The two pods with four turbojets and the six piston engines combined gave the B-36 a total of 40000 hp for short periods of time.

Crew
The B-36 had a crew of 15. As in the B-29 and B-50, the pressurized flight deck and crew compartment were linked to the rear compartment by a pressurized tunnel through the bomb bay. In the B-36, movement through the tunnel was on a wheeled trolley, pulling on a rope. The rear compartment featured six bunks and a dining galley and led to the tail turret.

Landing gear
The tricycle landing gear of the XB-36 featured a single-wheel main landing gear whose tires were the largest ever manufactured up to that time: 9 ft tall, 3 ft wide, and weighing 1320 lb, with enough rubber for 60 automobile tires. These tires placed so much ground pressure on runways that the XB-36 was restricted to Carswell Field adjacent to the factory in Texas, Eglin Field in Florida, and Fairfield-Suisun Field in California. At the suggestion of General Henry H. Arnold, the single-wheel gear was soon replaced by a four-wheeled bogie. At one point, a tank-like tracked landing gear was also tried on the XB-36, but it proved heavy and noisy. The tracked landing gear was quickly abandoned.

Weaponry
The four bomb bays could carry up to 87200 lb of bombs, more than 10 times the load carried by the World War II workhorse, the Boeing B-17 Flying Fortress, and substantially more than the entire B-17's gross weight of 54,000 lb. The B-36 was not designed with nuclear weapons in mind, because the mere existence of such weapons was top secret during the period when the B-36 was conceived and designed, and the initial B-36A was not capable of accommodating them. Nevertheless, the B-36 stepped into its nuclear delivery role immediately upon becoming operational. In all respects except speed, the B-36 could match what was arguably its approximate Soviet counterpart, the turboprop-powered Tu-95, which began production in January 1956 and is still in active service. Until the B-52 became operational, the B-36 was the only means of delivering the first generation Mark 17 hydrogen bomb, 25 ft long, 5 ft in diameter, and weighing 42000 lb, the heaviest and bulkiest American aerial nuclear bomb ever. The massive Mark 17 took up the aircraft's two aft bomb bays, while the forward bay could hold a Mark 6 atomic weapon.

The defensive armament consisted of six retractable gun turrets, with side-by-side turrets mounted in forward dorsal, aft dorsal and ventral positions, aft dorsal and non-retractable tail and nose turrets. Each turret was fitted with two 20 mm cannon, for a total of 16, and all turrets were remote controlled. Recoil vibration from gunnery practice often caused the aircraft's electrical wiring to jar loose or the vacuum tube electronics to malfunction, leading to failure of the aircraft controls and navigation equipment; this contributed to the crash of B-36B 44-92035 on 22 November 1950.

The Convair B-36 was the only aircraft designed to carry the T-12 Cloudmaker, a gravity bomb weighing 43600 lb and designed to produce an earthquake bomb effect. Part of the testing process involved dropping two of the bombs on a single flight mission, one from 30000 ft and the second from 40000 ft, for a total bomb load of 87200 lb.

The first prototype XB-36 flew on 8 August 1946. The speed and range of the prototype failed to meet the standards set out by the USAAC in 1941. This was expected, as the Pratt & Whitney R-4360 engines required were not yet available, and the qualified workers and materials needed to install them were lacking.

A second aircraft, the YB-36, flew on 4 December 1947. It had a redesigned, high-visibility, yet still "greenhouse-like" bubble canopy, heavily framed due to its substantial size, which was later adopted for production, and the engines used on the YB-36 were more powerful and more efficient. Altogether, the YB-36 was much closer to the production aircraft.

The first 21 B-36As were delivered in 1948. They were interim airframes, intended for crew training and later conversion. No defensive armament was fitted, since none was ready. Once later models were available, all B-36As were converted to RB-36E reconnaissance models. The first B-36 variant meant for normal operation was the B-36B, delivered beginning in November 1948. This aircraft met all the 1941 requirements, but had serious problems with engine reliability and maintenance (changing the 336 spark plugs was a task dreaded by ground crews) and with the availability of armaments and spare parts. Later models featured more powerful variants of the R-4360 engine, improved radar, and redesigned crew compartments.

The four jet engines increased fuel consumption and reduced range. Gun turrets were already recognized as obsolete, and newer bombers had been limited to just a tail turret, or no gunners at all for several years but the development of several air-to-air missiles, including the Soviet K-5 which began test firings in 1951, eliminated the last justifications for keeping them. In February 1954, the USAF awarded Convair a contract for a new "Featherweight" design program, which significantly reduced weight and crew size. The three configurations were: The six turrets eliminated by Featherweight I reduced the aircraft's crew from 15 to 9. Featherweight III had a longer range and an operating ceiling of at least 47000 ft, especially valuable for reconnaissance missions. The B-36J-III configuration (the last 14 made) had a single radar-aimed tail turret, extra fuel tanks in the outer wings, and landing gear allowing the maximum gross weight to rise to 410000 lb.
 * Featherweight I removed defensive hardware, including the six gun turrets.
 * Featherweight II removed the rear compartment crew comfort features, and all hardware accommodating the McDonnell XF-85 Goblin parasite fighter.
 * Featherweight III incorporated both configurations I and II.

Production of the B-36 ceased in 1954.

Operating and financial problems
Due to problems that occurred with the B-36 in its early stages of testing, development, and later in service, some critics referred to the aircraft as a "billion-dollar blunder". In particular, the United States Navy saw it as a costly bungle, diverting congressional funding and interest from naval aviation and aircraft carriers in general, and carrier–based nuclear bombers in particular. In 1947, the Navy attacked congressional funding for the B-36, alleging it failed to meet Pentagon requirements. The Navy held to the pre-eminence of the aircraft carrier in the Pacific during World War II, presuming carrier-based aircraft would be decisive in future wars. To this end, the Navy designed USS United States (CVA-58), a "supercarrier" capable of launching huge fleets of tactical aircraft or nuclear bombers. It then pushed to have funding transferred from the B-36 to USS United States. The Air Force successfully defended the B-36 project, and United States was officially cancelled by Secretary of Defense Louis A. Johnson in a cost-cutting move over the objections of both Secretary of the Navy John L. Sullivan and the Navy's senior uniformed leadership. Sullivan resigned in protest and was replaced as Secretary of the Navy by Francis P. Matthews, who had limited familiarity with defense issues, but was a close friend of Johnson. Several high-level Navy officials questioned the government's decision in cancelling the United States to fund the B-36, alleging a conflict of interest because Johnson had once served on Convair's board of directors. The uproar following the cancellation of United States in 1949 was nicknamed the "Revolt of the Admirals", during which time Matthews dismissed and forced into retirement the serving Chief of Naval Operations (CNO), Admiral Louis E. Denfeld, following Denfeld's testimony before the House Armed Services Committee.

The congressional and media furor over the firing of Admiral Denfeld, as well as the significant use of aircraft carriers in the Korean War, resulted in the Truman administration subsequently ousting both Johnson and Matthews in their respective secretary roles, and in the design and procurement of the subsequent Forrestal-class aircraft carrier of supercarriers, which were of comparable size to United States, but with a design geared towards greater multirole use with composite air wings of fighter, attack, reconnaissance, electronic warfare, early warning and antisubmarine-warfare aircraft. At the same time, heavy manned bombers for the SAC were also deemed crucial to national defense and, as a result, the two systems were never again in competition for the same budgetary resources.

Operational history
The B-36, including its GRB-36, RB-36, and XC-99 variants, was in USAF service as part of the SAC from 1948 to 1959. The RB-36 variants of the B-36 were used for reconnaissance during the Cold War with the Soviet Union and the B-36 bomber variants conducted training and test operations and stood ground and airborne alert, but the latter variants were never used offensively as bombers against hostile forces; they never fired a shot in combat.

Maintenance
The Wasp Major engines had a prodigious appetite for lubricating oil; each engine required a dedicated 100-gal (380-l) tank. Normal maintenance consisted of tedious measures, such as changing the 56 spark plugs on each of the six engines; the plugs were often fouled by the lead in the 145 octane antiknock fuel required by the R-4360 engines. Thus, each service required changing 336 spark plugs. The B-36 was too large to fit in most hangars. Since even an aircraft with the range of the B-36 needed to be stationed as close to enemy targets as possible, this meant the plane was largely based in the extreme weather locations of the northern continental United States, Alaska, and the Arctic. Since the maintenance had to be performed outdoors, the crews were largely exposed to the elements, with temperatures of -60 °F in winters and 100 °F in summers, depending on the airbase location. Special shelters were built so the maintenance crews could be given a modicum of protection. Ground crews were at risk of slipping and falling from icy wings, or being blown off the wings by propeller wash running in reverse pitch. The wing roots were thick enough, at 7 ft, to enable a flight engineer to access the engines and landing gear during flight by crawling through the wings. This was possible only at altitudes not requiring pressurization.

In 1950, Convair (then still Consolidated-Vultee) developed streamlined pods, looking like oversize drop tanks, that were mounted on each side of the B-36's fuselage to carry spare engines between bases. Each pod could airlift two engines. When the pods were empty, they were removed and carried in the bomb bays. No record was made of the special engine pods ever being used.

Engine fires

As engine fires occurred with the B-36's radial engines, some crews humorously changed the aircraft's slogan from "six turning, four burning" into "two turning, two burning, two smoking, two choking and two more unaccounted for". This problem was exacerbated by the propellers' pusher configuration, which increased carburetor icing. The design of the R-4360 engine tacitly assumed that it would be mounted in the conventional tractor configuration—propeller/air intake/28 cylinders/carburetor—with air flowing in that order. In this configuration, the carburetor is bathed in warmed air flowing past the engine, so it is unlikely to ice up. However, the R-4360 engines in the B-36 were mounted backwards, in the pusher configuration—air intake/carburetor/28 cylinders/propeller. The carburetor was now in front of the engine, so it could not benefit from engine heat. This placement also made more traditional short-term carburetor heat systems unsuitable. Hence, when intake air was cold and humid, ice gradually obstructed the carburetor air intake, which in turn gradually increased the richness of the air/fuel mixture until the unburned fuel in the exhaust caught fire. Three engine fires of this nature led to the first loss of an American nuclear weapon when a B-36 crashed in February 1950.

Crew experience
Training missions were typically in two parts, a 40-hour flight—followed by time on the ground for refueling and maintenance—and then a 24-hour second flight. With a sufficiently light load, the B-36 could fly at least 10,000 mi (16,000 km) nonstop, and the highest cruising speed of any version, the B-36J-III, was at 230 mph (380 km/h). Engaging the jet engines could raise the cruising speed to over 400 mph (650 km/h). Hence, a 40-hour mission, with the jets used only for takeoff and climbing, flew about 9,200 mi (15,000 km).

Due to its massive size, the B-36 was never considered sprightly or agile; Lieutenant General James Edmundson likened it to "sitting on your front porch and flying your house around". Crew compartments were nonetheless cramped, especially when occupied for 24 hours by a crew of 15 in full flight kit.

War missions would have been one-way, taking off from forward bases in Alaska or Greenland, overflying the USSR, and landing in Europe, Morocco, or the Middle East. Veteran crews recall feeling confident in their ability to fly the planned missions, but not to survive weapon delivery, as the aircraft may not have been fast enough to escape the blast. These concerns were borne out by the 1954 Operation Castle tests, in which B-36s were flown at the combat distance from the detonations of bombs in the 15-megaton range. At distances believed typical of wartime delivery, aircraft suffered extensive flash and blast damage.

Experiments
The B-36 was employed in a variety of aeronautical experiments throughout its service life. Its immense size, range, and payload capacity lent itself to use in research and development programs. These included nuclear propulsion studies, and "parasite" programs in which the B-36 carried smaller interceptors or reconnaissance aircraft.

In May 1946, the Air Force began the Nuclear Energy for the Propulsion of Aircraft project, which was followed in May 1951 by the Aircraft Nuclear Propulsion (ANP) program. The ANP program used modified B-36s to study shielding requirements for an airborne reactor to determine whether a nuclear-powered aircraft was feasible. Convair modified two B-36s under the MX-1589 project. The Nuclear Test Aircraft was a B-36H-20-CF (serial number 51-5712) that had been damaged in a tornado at Carswell AFB on 1 September 1952. This aircraft, designated the XB-36H (and later NB-36H), was modified to carry a 1 MW, air-cooled nuclear reactor in the aft bomb bay, with a four-ton lead disc shield installed in the middle of the aircraft between the reactor and the cockpit. A number of large air intake and exhaust holes were installed in the sides and bottom of the aircraft's rear fuselage to cool the reactor in flight. On the ground, a crane would be used to remove the 35000 lb reactor from the aircraft. To protect the crew, the highly modified cockpit was encased in lead and rubber, with a 1 ft leaded glass windshield. The reactor was operational, but did not power the aircraft; its sole purpose was to investigate the effect of radiation on aircraft systems. Between 1955 and 1957, the NB-36H completed 47 test flights and 215 hours of flight time, during 89 of which the reactor was critical.

Other experiments involved providing the B-36 with its own fighter defense in the form of parasite aircraft carried partially or wholly in a bomb bay. One parasite aircraft was the diminutive McDonnell XF-85 Goblin, which docked using a trapeze system. The concept was tested successfully using a B-29 carrier, but docking proved difficult even for experienced test pilots. Moreover, the XF-85 was seen as no match for contemporary foreign powers' newly developed interceptor aircraft in development and in service; consequently, the project was cancelled.

More successful was the FICON project, involving a modified B-36 (called a GRB-36D "mothership") and the RF-84K, a fighter modified for reconnaissance, in a bomb bay. The GRB-36D would ferry the RF-84K to the vicinity of the objective, whereupon the RF-84K would disconnect and begin its mission. Ten GRB-36Ds and 25 RF-84Ks were built and had limited service in 1955–1956.

Projects Tip Tow and Tom-Tom involved docking F-84s to the wingtips of B-29s and B-36s. The hope was that the increased aspect ratio of the combined aircraft would result in a greater range. Project Tip Tow was cancelled when an EF-84D and a specially modified test EB-29A crashed, killing everyone on both aircraft. This accident was attributed to the EF-84D flipping over onto the wing of the EB-29A. Project Tom-Tom, involving RF-84Fs and a GRB-36D from the FICON project (redesignated JRB-36F), continued for a few months after this crash, but was also cancelled due to the violent turbulence induced by the wingtip vortices of the B-36.

Strategic reconnaissance

One of the SAC's initial missions was to plan strategic aerial reconnaissance on a global scale. The first efforts were in photo-reconnaissance and mapping. Along with the photo-reconnaissance mission, a small electronic intelligence cadre was operating. Weather reconnaissance was part of the effort, as was long-range detection, the search for Soviet atomic explosions. In the late 1940s, strategic intelligence on Soviet capabilities and intentions was scarce. Before the development of the Lockheed U-2 high-altitude spy plane and Corona orbital reconnaissance satellites, technology and politics limited American reconnaissance efforts to the borders, and not the heartland, of the Soviet Union.

One of the essential criteria of the early postwar reconnaissance aircraft was the ability to cruise above 40000 ft, a level determined by knowledge of the capability of Soviet air-defense radar. The main Soviet air-defense radar in the 1950s was the American-supplied SCR-270, or locally made copies, which were only effective up to 40000 ft – in theory, an aircraft cruising above this level would remain undetected.

The first aircraft to put this theory to the test was the RB-36D specialized photo-reconnaissance version of the B-36D. It was outwardly identical to the standard B-36D, but carried a crew of 22 rather than 15, the additional crew members being needed to operate and maintain the photo-reconnaissance equipment that was carried. The forward bomb bay in the bomber was replaced by a pressurized, manned compartment that was filled with 14 cameras. This compartment included a small darkroom, where a photo technician could develop the film. The second bomb bay contained up to 80 T-86 photoflash bombs, while the third bay could carry an extra 3000 USgal, droppable fuel tank. The fourth bomb bay carried electronic countermeasure equipment. The defensive armament of 16 M-24A-1 20-mm cannons was retained. The extra fuel tanks increased the flight endurance to up to 50 hours. It had an operational ceiling of 50000 ft. Later, a lightweight version of this aircraft, the RB-36-III, could even reach 58000 ft. RB-36s were distinguished by the bright aluminum finish of the camera compartment (contrasting with the dull magnesium of the rest of the fuselage) and by a series of radar domes under the aft fuselage, varying in number and placement. When developed, it was the only American aircraft having enough range to fly over the Eurasian land mass from bases in the United States, and large enough to carry the bulky, high-resolution cameras of the day.

The standard RB-36D carried up to 23 cameras, primarily K-17C, K-22A, K-38, and K-40 cameras. A special 240-inch focal length camera (known as the Boston Camera after the university where it was designed) was tested on 44-92088, the aircraft being redesignated ERB-36D. The long focal length was achieved by using a two-mirror reflection system. The camera was capable of resolving a golf ball at an altitude and side range of 45000 ft. That is a slant range over 63600 ft. The camera and the contact print of this test can be seen at the National Museum of the United States Air Force at Wright Patterson AFB.

The first RB-36D (44-92088) made its initial flight on 18 December 1949, only six months after the first B-36D had flown. It initially flew without the turbojets. The 28th Strategic Reconnaissance Wing based at Rapid City AFB (later renamed Ellsworth AFB), South Dakota, received its first RB-36D on 3 June 1950. Due to severe material shortages, the new RB-36Ds did not become operationally ready until June 1951. The 24th and last RB-36D was delivered in May 1951. A total of 24 RB-36Ds were built. Some RB-36Ds were later modified to the featherweight configuration, in which all but the tail guns were removed. The crew was reduced from 22 to 19. These aircraft were redesignated as RB-36D-III. Modifications were carried out by Convair from February to November 1954.

With a range of 9300 mi, RB-36Ds began probing the boundaries of the Soviet Arctic in 1951. Although on-board equipment indicated detection by Soviet radar, interceptions at the B-36's service ceiling would have remained difficult. RB-36 aircraft operating from RAF Sculthorpe in England made a number of overflights of Soviet Arctic bases, particularly the new nuclear weapons test complex at Novaya Zemlya. RB-36s performed a number of rarely acknowledged reconnaissance missions and are believed to have frequently penetrated Chinese (and Soviet) airspace under the direction of General Curtis LeMay.

In early 1950, Convair began converting B-36As to a reconnaissance configuration; included in the conversions was the sole YB-36 (42-13571). These converted examples were all redesignated RB-36E. The six R-4360-25 engines were replaced by six R-4360-41s. They were also equipped with the four J-47 jet engines that were fitted to the RB-36D. Its normal crew was 22, which included five gunners to man the 16 M-24A-1 20-mm cannon. The last conversion was completed in July 1951. Later, the USAF also bought 73 long-range reconnaissance versions of the B-36H under the designation RB-36H; 23 were accepted during the first six months of 1952, and the last were delivered by September 1953. More than a third of all B-36s were reconnaissance models.

Advances in Soviet air defense systems meant that the RB-36 became limited to flying outside the borders of the Soviet Union, as well as Eastern Europe. By the mid-1950s, the jet-powered Boeing RB-47E was able to pierce Soviet airspace and conduct a variety of spectacular overflights of the Soviet Union. Some of these flights probed deep into the heart of the Soviet Union, taking photographic and radar recordings of the route attacking SAC bombers would follow to reach their targets. Flights that involved penetrating mainland Russia were termed sensitive intelligence (SENSINT) missions. One RB-47 flew 450 mi inland and photographed the city of Igarka in Siberia.

As with the strategic bombardment versions, the RB-36 was phased out of the SAC inventory beginning in 1956, the last being sent to Davis–Monthan Air Force Base in January 1959.

Obsolescence

With the appearance of the Soviet Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-15 in combat over North Korea in 1950, USAF propeller-driven bombers were rendered obsolete as strategic offensive weapons. Both the B-36 and the B-29/B-50 Superfortresses were designed during World War II, prior to the jet age. A new generation of swept-wing jet bombers, able to fly higher and faster, was needed to effectively overcome the MiG-15 or subsequent Soviet interceptors if the Cold War escalated into armed conflict. In 1952, while the Korean War was still in full combat, the Convair YB-60, developed from the B-36, entered a design competition with the Boeing YB-52. By early 1953, the Boeing product had emerged as the preferred design.

After fighting in Korea had ceased, President Eisenhower called for a "new look" at national defense. His administration chose to invest in the USAF, especially SAC, retiring nearly all of its B-29/B-50s in favour of the new B-47 Stratojet, introduced in 1951. By 1955, the B-52 Stratofortress was entering the inventory in substantial numbers, which replaced B-36s.

Two major factors contributing to the obsolescence of the B-36 and its phaseout were a lack of aerial refueling capability (instead requiring intermediate refueling bases to reach planned targets deep in the Soviet Union) and its slow speed (making it vulnerable to jet interceptors and thus severely decreasing its likelihood of reaching targets in Soviet territory).

The scrapping of B-36s began in February 1956. Once replaced by B-52s, they were flown directly from operational squadrons to Davis–Monthan AFB, Arizona, where the Mar-Pak Corporation handled their reclamation and destruction. Defense cutbacks in FY 1958 compelled the B-52 procurement process to be stretched out and the B-36 service life to be extended. The B-36s remaining in service were supported with components scavenged from aircraft sent to Davis–Monthan. Further update work was undertaken by Convair at San Diego (Specialized Aircraft Maintenance, SAM-SAC) until 1957 to extend the life and capabilities of the B-36s. By December 1958, only 22 B-36Js were still operational.

On 12 February 1959, the last B-36J built, AF Ser. No. 52-2827, left Biggs AFB, Texas, where it had been on duty with the 95th Heavy Bombardment Wing, and was flown to Amon Carter Field in Fort Worth, where it was put on display. Within two years, all B-36s, except five used for museum display, had been scrapped at Davis–Monthan AFB.

Variants

 * XB-36
 * Prototype powered by six 3000 hp R-4360-25 engines and unarmed, one built.

 * YB-36
 * Prototype, s/n 42-13571, with modified nose and raised cockpit roof, one built later converted to YB-36A.

 * YB-36A
 * Former YB-36 with modified four-wheel landing gear, later modified as a RB-36E.

 * B-36A
 * Production variant, unarmed, used for training, 22 built, all but one converted to RB-36E.

 * XC-99
 * A cargo/transport version of the B-36. One built.

 * B-36B
 * Armed production variant with six 3500 hp R-4360-41 engines, 73 built, later conversions to RB-36D and B-36D.

 * RB-36B
 * Designation for 39 B-36Bs temporarily fitted with a camera installation.

 * YB-36C
 * Projected variant of the B-36B with six 4300 hp R-4360-51 engines driving tractor propellers, not built.

 * B-36C
 * Production version of the YB-36, completed as B-36Bs.

 * B-36D
 * Same as B-36B, but fitted with four J47-GE-19 engines, two each in two underwing pods, 22 built and 64 conversions from B-36B.

 * RB-36D
 * Strategic reconnaissance variant with two bomb bays fitted with camera installation, 17 built and seven conversions from B-36B.

 * GRB-36D
 * Same as RB-36D, but modified to carry a GRF-84F Thunderstreak on a ventral trapeze as part of the FICON program, 10 modified.

 * RB-36E
 * The YB-36A and 21 B-36As converted to RB-36D standards.

 * B-36F
 * Same as B-36D, but fitted with six 3800 hp R-4360-53 engines and four J47-GE-19 engines, 34 built.

 * RB-36F
 * Strategic reconnaissance variant of the B-36F with additional fuel capacity, 24 built.

 * YB-36G
 * See YB-60.

 * B-36H
 * Same as B-36F with improved cockpit and equipment changes, 83 built.

 * NB-36H
 * One B-36H fitted with a nuclear reactor installation for trials, had a revised cockpit and raised nose. This was intended to evolve into the Convair X-6.

 * RB-36H
 * Strategic reconnaissance variant of the B-36H, 73 built.

 * B-36J
 * High altitude variant with strengthened landing gear, increased fuel capacity, armament reduced to tail guns only and reduced crew, 33 built.

 * YB-60
 * Originally designated the YB-36G, s/n 49-2676 and 49-2684. Project for a jet-powered swept wing variant. Due to the differences from a standard B-36 its designation was changed to YB-60.

 * Model 6
 * Proposed double-deck airliner marrying the fuselage of the B-36 with the wings and empennage of the YB-60; not built.

Related models
In 1951, the USAF asked Convair to build a prototype of an all-jet variant of the B-36. Convair complied by replacing the wings on a B-36F with swept wings, from which were suspended eight Pratt & Whitney XJ57-P-3 jet engines. The result was the B-36G, later renamed the Convair YB-60. The YB-60 was deemed inferior to Boeing's YB-52, and the project was terminated. Just as the C-97 was the transport variant of the B-50, the B-36 was the basis for the Convair XC-99, a double-decked military cargo plane that was the largest piston-engined, land-based aircraft ever built. Its length of 185 ft made it the longest practical aircraft of its era. The sole example built was extensively employed for nearly 10 years, especially for cross-country cargo flights during the Korean War. In 2005, this XC-99 was dismantled in anticipation of its being moved from the former Kelly Air Force Base, now the Kelly Field Annex of Lackland AFB in San Antonio, Texas, where it had been retired since 1957. The XC-99 was subsequently relocated to the National Museum of the United States Air Force at Wright-Patterson AFB for restoration, with C-5 Galaxy transports carrying pieces of the XC-99 to Wright-Patterson as space and schedule permitted.

A commercial airliner derived from the XC-99, the Convair Model 37, never left the drawing board. It would have been the first "jumbo" airliner.

Operators
United States Air Force – Strategic Air Command 2d Air Force
 * 🇺🇸 United States
 * 72d Strategic Reconnaissance Wing – Ramey AFB, Puerto Rico (October 1952 – January 1959)
 * 60th and 301st Strategic Reconnaissance Squadrons, Tail Code: Square F

8th Air Force
 * 6th Bombardment Wing – Walker AFB, New Mexico (August 1952 – August 1957)
 * 24th, 39th and 40th Bombardment Squadrons, Tail Code: Triangle R
 * 7th Bombardment Wing – Carswell AFB, Texas (June 1948 – May 1958)
 * 9th, 436th and 492d Bombardment Squadrons, Tail Code: Triangle J
 * 11th Bombardment Wing – Carswell AFB, Texas (December 1948 – December 1957)
 * 26th, 42d and 98th Bombardment Squadrons, Tail Code: Triangle U
 * 28th Strategic Reconnaissance Wing – Ellsworth AFB, South Dakota (May 1949 – April 1950)
 * 77th, 717th and 718th Strategic Reconnaissance Squadrons, Tail Code: Circle X
 * 42d Bombardment Wing, Loring AFB, Maine (April 1953 – September 1956)
 * 69th, 70th and 75th Bombardment Squadrons

15th Air Force
 * 92d Bombardment Wing – Fairchild AFB, Washington (July 1951 – March 1956)
 * 325th, 326th and 327th Bombardment Squadrons, Tail Code: Circle W
 * 95th Bombardment Wing – Biggs AFB, Texas (August 1953 – February 1959)
 * 334th, 335th and 336th Bombardment Squadrons
 * 5th Strategic Reconnaissance Wing – Fairfield-Suisun AFB (later Travis AFB), California (January 1951 – September 1958)
 * 5th, 31st and 72d Strategic Reconnaissance Squadrons, Tail Code: Circle X
 * 9th Strategic Reconnaissance Wing – Fairfield-Suisun AFB, California (May 1949 – April 1950)
 * 1st Bombardment Squadron
 * 99th Strategic Reconnaissance Wing – Fairchild AFB, Washington (August 1951 – September 1956)
 * 346th, 347th and 348th Strategic Reconnaissance Squadrons, Tail Code: Circle I

Note: SAC eliminated tail codes in 1953.

Surviving aircraft
only four complete B-36 type aircraft survive from the original 384 produced.
 * RB-36H
 * AF Ser. No. 51-13730 is at Castle Air Museum at the former Castle Air Force Base in Atwater, California. It was previously displayed at the former Chanute Air Force Base in Rantoul, Illinois from 1957 to 1991.

 * B-36J
 * AF Ser. No. 52-2217 is at the Strategic Air Command and Aerospace Museum, formerly located at Offutt Air Force Base, and now off-base near Ashland, Nebraska.
 * AF Ser. No. 52-2220 is at the National Museum of the United States Air Force at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base. Its flight to the museum from Davis–Monthan Air Force Base in Arizona on 30 April 1959 was the last flight of a B-36. This B-36J replaced the former Air Force Museum's original YB-36, AF Serial Number 42-13571. This was also the first aircraft to be placed in the museum's new display hangar, and was not moved again until relocated to the museum's latest addition in 2003. It is displayed alongside the only surviving example of the massive 9 ft lower main gear strut, single wheel and tire that was used on the original XB-36.
 * AF Ser. No. 52-2827 is at the Pima Air and Space Museum, adjacent to Davis–Monthan Air Force Base in Tucson, Arizona. This aircraft was the final B-36 built, named The City of Fort Worth, and lent to the city of Fort Worth on 12 February 1959. It sat on the field at the Greater Southwest International Airport until that airfield was closed and the property was redeveloped as a business park adjacent to Dallas/Fort Worth International Airport. Some attempts were made to begin restoration at that location through the early 1970s. It then moved to the short-lived Southwest Aerospace Museum, which was located between the former Carswell Air Force Base (now Naval Air Station Joint Reserve Base Fort Worth) and the former General Dynamics (now Lockheed Martin) assembly plant, where it was originally built; some restoration took place while at the plant. As Lockheed Martin had no place to display the finished aircraft, and local community efforts in Fort Worth to build a facility to house and maintain the massive aircraft fell short, the NMUSAF retook possession of the aircraft and it was transported to Tucson for loan to the Pima Air and Space Museum. It was fully restored and reassembled at that museum, just south of Davis–Monthan AFB, and is displayed at that location.

Notable incidents and accidents
Though the B-36 had a solid overall safety record, well above average for the class and time, 10 B-36s were involved in accidents between 1949 and 1954 (three B-36Bs, three B-36Ds, and four B-36Hs). A total of 32 B-36s were written off in accidents between 1949 and 1957 of 385 built. When a crash occurred, the magnesium-rich airframe burned easily.

On 14 February 1950 off the northwest coast of British Columbia on Princess Royal Island, 17 crewmen parachuted from their blazing B-36B; 12 crewmen were found with one injured, and five were reported missing.

On Labor Day, Monday, 1 September 1952, a tornado hit Carswell Air Force Base, Fort Worth, damaging aircraft of the 7th and 11th Bomber Wings' complement of B-36s. Some two-thirds of the USAF's entire B-36 fleet was affected, as well as six aircraft being built at that point at Convair's Fort Worth plant. The base was shut down and operations transferred to Meacham Field. Joint repairs by Convair and the USAF got 10 of the 61 B-36s running within two weeks and repaired the other 51 aircraft within five weeks; 18 of 19 heavily damaged aircraft (and the six damaged and unfinished aircraft at Convair) were repaired by May 1953. The 19th (#2051) had to be scrapped, and was used as a nuclear testing site ground target. One heavily damaged aircraft (#5712) was written off and rebuilt as the NB-36H Nuclear Reactor Testbed aircraft.

On February 2, 1953 Convair B-36H Serial No 51-5729 crashed 16 miles southwest of CFB Goose Bay, Labrador, following a transatlantic flight from RAF Fairford. The aircraft was misaligned and crashed in a wooded and hilly terrain. It was determined that the accident was the consequence of a misguiding on part of the GCA in Labrador. 15 of the 17 crew members survived.

On the night of 17 March 1953, aircraft RB-36H-25, 51-13721, took off from the Canary Islands on a mission to test North American air defenses. A change in weather conditions pushed the aircraft off course, and early in the morning on 18 March the aircraft crashed into a mountain on the western side of Trinity Bay (48.18435°N, -53.66427°W) just north of the community of Burgoyne's Cove, Newfoundland, Canada. All 23 crew members, including Brigadier General Richard Ellsworth, were killed.

B-36s were involved in two "Broken Arrow" incidents. On 13 February 1950, B-36 serial number 44-92075, crashed in an unpopulated region of British Columbia, resulting in the first loss of an American atom bomb. The bomb's plutonium core was dummy lead, but it did have TNT, and it detonated over the ocean before the crew bailed out. Locating the crash site took some effort. On 4 November 2016, however, an object similar to the bomb was reported to have been located by a diver near the archipelago of Haida Gwaii, 80 km off the coast of British Columbia; the Royal Canadian Navy said vessels would be deployed to investigate the object. After investigation, the Royal Canadian Navy determined that it was not the lost bomb. Later in 1954, the airframe, stripped of sensitive material, was substantially destroyed in situ by a U.S. military recovery team.

On 22 May 1957, a B-36 accidentally dropped a Mark 17 thermonuclear bomb 4.5 mi from the control tower while landing at Kirtland Air Force Base in Albuquerque, New Mexico. The weapon had come loose from its mount and fell through the bomb bay doors, creating a large hole in the bottom of the aircraft, and sending the aircraft into an uncontrollable climb due to the sudden and unexpected loss of weight. Only the conventional explosives detonated, as the bomb was unarmed. The aircraft made a safe landing. These incidents were classified for decades. See list of military nuclear accidents.

Notable appearances in media
In 1949, the B-36 was featured in the documentary film, Target: Peace, about the operations of the 7th Bombardment Wing at Carswell AFB. Other scenes included B-36 production at the Fort Worth plant.

Strategic Air Command is a 1955 American film starring James Stewart as a Major League Baseball star and World War II veteran who is called back to active duty to become a B-36 pilot and flight commander for SAC.

The documentary Lost Nuke (2004) chronicles a 2003 Canadian expedition that set out to solve the mystery of the world's first lost nuclear weapon. The team traveled to the remote mountain site of the 1950 British Columbia B-36 crash.

title: Convair B-36 Peacemaker


text:
Sudan (region)

Sudan is the geographical region to the south of the Sahara, stretching from Western Africa to Central and Eastern Africa. The name derives from the Arabic ' and ', both meaning "the lands of the Black [Africans]", referring to West Africa and northern Central Africa.

History
According to some modern historians, of all the regions of Africa, western Sudan "is the one that has seen the longest development of agriculture, of markets and long-distance trade, and of complex political systems." It is also the first region "south of the Sahara where African Islam took root and flowered."

Middle Ages
Its medieval history is marked by the caravan trade. The sultanates of eastern Sudan were Darfur, Bagirmi, Sennar and Wadai. In central Sudan, Kanem–Bornu Empire and the Hausa Kingdoms. To the west were Wagadou, Manden, Songhay and the Mossi.

Slave trade
Early on in the first millennium, many people from the Sudan were used as "a steady steam of slaves for the Mediterranean world" in the Saharan slave trade. With the arrival of the Portuguese in the fifteenth century, "people were directed to the Atlantic slave trade," totaling over a thousand years for the Saharan and four centuries for the Atlantic trades. As a result, slavery critically shaped the institutions and systems of the Sudan. The Portuguese first arrived at Senegambia and found that slavery was "well established" in the region, used to "feed the courts of coastal kings as it was used in the medieval empires of the interior." Between the process of capture, enslavement, and "incorporation into a new community, the slave had neither rights nor any social identity." As a result, the identity of people who were enslaved "came from membership in a corporate group, usually based on kinship."

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/

title: Sudan (region)


text:
Talk:Historicism

idealistic fallacy
What is that? There is no link and no google search thing for it. 89.150.118.208 (talk) 13:20, 26 May 2013 (UTC)

(December 2003 comments)
The historicist position is that there is no objective way to determine which of the various competing theories on a subject is correct

The above quote, which came from the entry on historicism, shows the historicism is self-contradictory.
 * Only if you assume that there is no subjective way to decide if a theory is correct...

(May-July 2005)
"Hegelian historicism" is a grotesque and fantastic misrepresentation of Hegel's views, which were much closer to the opposite of what is said here. His views were merely that philosophical, scientific etc truth develops historically and dialectically, in a natural manner. "Philosophy is the history of philosophy" means that the historical positions of the various philosophers were genuine attempts to find truth and expressed it, more or less as well as could be done at the time, and which were and are successively improved and incorporated in later and more complex and concrete philosophy as time goes on. According to Hegel, who could thus hardly be further from Nihilism, it is impossible, indeed ludicrous, to refute real philosophy.--John Z 20:40, 15 May 2005 (UTC)

 * As soon as I saw that, I had to try to rewrite it. In one sense Hegel is historicism, and his views need to be better represented.  I hope that what I produced is an improvement.  Smerdis of Tlön 18:19, 23 Jun 2005 (UTC)

 * Good job on this. I'm glad you did it - it is of course much, much better than what preceded. Thanks - means I don't feel compelled to!--John Z 2 July 2005 05:39 (UTC)

Anglo-Saxon v. German "historicism"
The page is currently devoted entirely the notion of "historicism" as used by Karl Popper. There is another sense of "historicism" which is completely different, advocated by German theorists and thought to have started with Meineke and Ranke and the like (it is in fact almost completely anti-Hegelian). My question is whether or not this distinction should be attempted to be made into this article, or whether a separate article should be held for each? They are completely unrelated as far as I can tell, but are both very interesting and important in histiographical studies. --Fastfission 16:51, 8 October 2005 (UTC)

 * According to ,

 * Ranke's aim was to reconstruct the unique periods of the past as they actually were and to avoid injecting the history of former times with the spirit of the present; this approach to historiography is known as historicism.

Is that a good statement of the other sense of "historicism" to which you are referring? If so, it doesn't seem completely different from the need for historical context mentioned in the New historicism and Modern historicism sections of the article. So perhaps there is after all a connection which can be exploited to link the use of the term in Ranke's sense into the existing article. -- JimR 02:39, 9 October 2005 (UTC)

 * The Rankean idea of history is very, very different from new or modern historicism (on a very superficial level it can look like little more than empiricism but there's more to it than that, and its ideas about what is possible in terms of objectivity, and its ideas about the purpose of history, are considerably different than new/modern historicism) -- thinkers like Foucault and Kuhn would not be caught in the same room with a true Rankean. But I think I've discovered a solution: the actual, non-Anglicized German term is Historismus, which could have an article of its own, and this one could have a little note about the difference. --Fastfission 02:50, 9 October 2005 (UTC)

 * OK, go for it! A Google search for English pages does suggest a few precedents for using Historismus in English. -- JimR 03:50, 9 October 2005 (UTC)

 * Or . . . instead of the German word, how about using the term "historism" for the article name, as the English translation of Historismus? For example, have a look at the (copyright) page, and in particular the first paragraph in it which contains the name "Popper".  It seems that while introducing his meaning of "historicism", Popper continued to use "historism" for the German idea, in The Poverty of Historicism; if I remember rightly this is also the case in Enemies of the Open Society.  -- JimR 11:23, 11 October 2005 (UTC)

 * As long as there is no consensus on this: I made Historism redirect to Historicism. The original page seemed to contain only spam, there was no meaningful content. Crix 03:21, 3 July 2006 (UTC)

 * I really think an addition should be made to this article regarding the alternative, Rankean definition of historicism. I'm a history MA student, studying in Canada, and if I used the word "historicism" around any of my history profs or fellow students, they would immediately assume I was talking about Ranke.  It's pretty much the standard definition of "historicism" in the circles I occupy.  Maybe for philosophers or European academics it has another meaning, but for North American historians, "historicism" = Leopold von Ranke.    --   Mark  (August 6, 2006)

 * I've been doing some more research on this, and really, you HAVE to change this article! Historicism has two essentially opposite meanings, one in which history is a function of truth (Hegel) and one in which truth is a function of history (Ranke).  Just look it up in the dictionary.  Furthermore, if anything, the Rankean version is the more common one.  It's listed as the "core sense" in the Concise OED, while Hegel's version is relegated to a "subsense".  You have focussed your article on specialized meanings of the term, while ignoring those which are most common.  If you want more proof go read Georg Iggers entry on "historicism" from the ~Dictionary of the History of Ideas~.  It's available free online: http://etext.virginia.edu/cgi-local/DHI/dhi.cgi?id=dv2-52  --  Mark (August 8, 2006)

 * Thank you for your suggestion! When you feel an article needs improvement, please feel free to make those changes. Wikipedia is a wiki, so anyone can edit almost any article by simply following the  link at the top. You don't even need to log in (although there are many reasons why you might want to).  The Wikipedia community encourages you to be bold in updating pages. Don't worry too much about making honest mistakes — they're likely to be found and corrected quickly. If you're not sure how editing works, check out how to edit a page, or use the sandbox to try out your editing skills.  New contributors are always welcome. -- JimR 06:28, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

Popper's attack on historicism
This section of the article tells us what Popper think Historicism is, and that the writer of the article tends to think his definition should not be applied to Hegel, but we never got to actually learn what Popper's "attack on historicism" actually was. Put differently, there's no connection between the title of the section and its content. 192.115.133.141 12:35, 13 October 2005 (UTC)

 * Good point! I've attempted a description of Popper's attack, but it's many years since I read The Open Society, so if anyone has a copy handy, please quote from it (sparingly under fair use), and/or correct or neutralise my point of view.  -- JimR 17:14, 14 October 2005 (UTC)

Citation for Hegel quotation?
Could a direct citation or better yet, the german of the given Hegel quotation be provided? The very article seems to be all over the internet yet this quotation is cited nowhere and my searches for the German have resulted in rather different but similar lines.

(129.206.196.162, 9 November 2005)

 * Put on a citation needed sign so that mirrors will be able to recognise the problem, and hopefully someone who knows where to find the quote. Ansell 04:24, 8 April 2006 (UTC)

Many quotations have been falsely attributed to Hegel. It should be remembered that most of Hegel's books were merely lecture notes that were accumulated by his students. The problem is compounded by the notorious obscurity of Hegel's teachings, in which concepts are not illustrated by perceptual experience. Therefore, any time, without exception, that a quotation is attributed to Hegel, there should be a definite, precise citation.71.125.136.45 17:00, 18 July 2007 (UTC)Lestrade

Mr. Gruder,

Perhaps when you are amongst cordial intellectuals such as those that are found on this discussion page, you could strive to suppress your animalistic instinct to use such foul language. It is indicative of a person who generally does not possess the intelligence to express himself or herself in a precise manner and thus reverts to spewing forth verbal sewage. While you are pondering your decision, you may also wish to brush up on your spelling, it is spelled "unencyclopedic", not "Unencylopedic". To all those discussing historicism on this page, keep up the good work.

Regards, J.R.R. 138.162.128.53 19:55, 10 August 2007 (UTC)

"Burke" - who?
Who is the Burke referred to alongside Tocqueville, Augustine, and Mill? Can someone else disambiguate as necessary, as I'm not familiar with the subject so may well choose the wrong one.--94.197.161.111 (talk) 20:06, 2 August 2009 (UTC)
 * It can be none other than Edmund Burke. The "mill" in question is undoubtedly John Stuart Mill. The article could really use some citations, but that is another matter. --Saddhiyama (talk) 20:13, 2 August 2009 (UTC)

Add Vico
I would add Vico as the initiator of the concept. —Preceding unsigned comment added by FixMacs (talk • contribs) 23:46, 24 November 2009 (UTC)

Any reference to Vico should be qualified. In fact, a careful reading of Vico points against any historicist leaning (in spite of what some popular English interpreters would suggest). At the very least, *arguments* are needed to back the claim that elements of historicism are to be found in Vico. Otherwise, one must believe Vico when he swears by ancient political Platonism, or where he defends the classical teaching of natural right against its modern detractors (Machiavelli, Spinoza, Hobbes, etc.) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 87.16.191.44 (talk) 21:03, 10 February 2013 (UTC)

First sentence
"Historicism is a mode of thinking in which the basic significance of specific social context--e.g., time, place, local conditions--is central; whereas the notion of fundamental generalizable immutable 'laws' in the realm of sociology/social behaviour tends to be rejected." This is a wonderfully academic sentence. It separates a fragment by using two dashes. It parenthesizes the word "laws" so you are not sure of the meaning of the word. It uses a slash to confuse "sociology" and "social." In general, it is a marvellously obscure sentence worthy of the great Hegel himself. If the purpose of a Wikipedia article is to astound, amaze, and impress its readers, then this sentence is first–rate. If, however, the reader is looking for information, then this is not the article to read.Lestrade (talk) 13:40, 20 February 2010 (UTC)Lestrade

Yes, but look what was there before. If the purpose of a Wikipedia article is to astound, amaze, and impress its readers, then what was on offer before was falling short. And was not even an attempt to be concise, accurate, incisive, etc.--Artiquities (talk) 14:06, 21 February 2010 (UTC)
 * Wikipedia Principle of Relativity: Bad is Good when it is compared with Very Bad.Lestrade (talk) 19:09, 21 February 2010 (UTC)Lestrade

Although I can't formulate a good first sentence, I agree that the current one is terrible, absolutely meaningless. Hoping someone better qualified than me can replace it.

"Historicism is a mode of thinking that assigns a central and basic significance to a specific context, such as historical period, geographical place and local culture." — Preceding unsigned comment added by 90.196.122.233 (talk) 14:27, 6 October 2014 (UTC)

Julian Steward
I didn't think Steward was completely relativist. He did see culture as shaped by local environmental adaptations (especially subsistence, technology, and economy-- his 'culture core'), but he famously broke ties with his intellectual father (Alfred L. Kroeber) and intellectual grandfather (Franz Boas) in both his supposed ″environmental determinism″ and his embrace of White's Multilineal evolution. I'll have to look this up and update later, but I am fairly certain he was in favor of cross-cultural comparisons, as long as comprehensive work had been done on the cultures being compared. Tiredmeliorist (talk) 07:43, 7 March 2016 (UTC)

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Some definitions from OUP
From the Oxford Dictionary of Human Geography: 1. An approach to understanding human affairs that focuses on the prior circumstances leading up to an event.

2. An approach to understanding human affairs that regards the present as the predictable outcome of past processes.

Historicism in the first sense is a deeply contextual approach to description and explanation—the opposite of reductionism and essentialism. In the second sense, historicism has been seen by some critics as a signal failing of orthodox versions of Marxism. From the Oxford Dictionary of Critical Theory: The view that past events must be understood and judged within the context of their own times. This is because, as G. W. F. Hegel argued, all societies are the product of their history. So, for example, New Historicism argues that to read Shakespeare properly one has to read it from the perspective of his peers, and see it as his original audiences did. Historicism also refers to the view that history unfolds according to certain inexorable laws, such as the economic laws of supply and demand. For this reason Marxism is often regarded as a form of historicism, though not all Marxist scholars accept this label (Louis Althusser, for one, rejects it completely). Karl Popper wrote derisive critiques of historicism, which was a codeword for Marxism for him in any case, arguing (quite mistakenly) that it is totalitarian in that it tries to describe everything that happens and in that it imposes a single narrative on the unfolding of events. From the Oxford Dictionary of Sociology: According to Karl Popper, historicism is ‘an approach to the social sciences which assumes that historical prediction is their principal aim, and which assumes that this aim is attainable by discovering the “rhythms” or the “patterns”, the “laws” or the “trends” that underlie the evolution of history’ (The Poverty of Historicism, 1957). Historicism is therefore the belief in laws of history, of social development, or of progress. Political ideologies such as fascism and communism are often said to be erected upon historicist foundations. From The Concise Oxford Dictionary of Politics: Doctrine that historical events are governed by natural laws, which in turn determine social and cultural developments, beliefs, and values specific to each period of history. From the Oxford Dictionary of the Social Sciences: A term with two conflicting but not strictly incompatible meanings: according to the first, historicism is a strong version of historical relativism and holds that historical eras can be understood only on their own terms. At its limit, this view challenges the validity of historical comparisons (see historical particularism). The second meaning is Karl Raimund Popper's well-known characterization of historicism as the search for social and historical laws that enable predictions about the future. Popper was critical of such ambitions and targeted in particular the scientific claims of Marxism, which he argued had been shown to be false. He also extended his critique toward a wide range of teleological theories of modernity and modernization. From The Concise Oxford Dictionary of Archaeology: A general and increasingly ambiguous term meaning a number of different things to different people. At its heart, however, is the idea that a society and its culture exist mainly in their dynamic and developmental character. In this it gives emphasis to non‐rational behaviour, all‐round creativity, and doubts many of the beliefs inherent to a progressive view of change. From The Oxford Companion to Philosophy: A label which has been confusingly applied to distinguishable positions in social philosophy. It was originally used to refer to a particular conception of the aims of history which emphasized the need to recognize the essential individuality of historical phenomena; these phenomena, being expressive of human thought and feeling, required for their proper understanding an empathetic grasp of the conditions that gave them life and meaning in a social context. A wider interpretation of the term, often held to have relativist implications, involves the claim that the nature of any phenomenon can only be adequately comprehended by considering its place within a process of historical development. Thirdly, it has been employed to designate doctrines which attribute to the social sciences the role of predicting future developments on the basis of discoverable laws of historical change. From the Oxford Dictionary of Media and Communication: 1. A pejorative synonym for historical determinism or historical relativism.

2. (historism) The stance that events and/or ideas need to be interpreted within their historical context (historical contingency), or that human phenomena should be seen in terms of their historical development. Such standpoints are often framed in opposition to universalism, essentialism, and formalism. However, over-emphasis on historical variability and the uniqueness of circumstances is criticized as relativistic.

3. The hermeneutic approach in which it is argued that historical interpretation requires us to adopt the values and assumptions of the time, seeing the phenomenon in its own terms and not ours. ‘Always historicize,’ declared Fredric Jameson in 1981. Critics have either branded this approach as cultural relativism or have emphasized that interpreters cannot escape their own historical situatedness.

[4. New Historicism.]

5. In architecture and design, styles drawing inspiration from the past. The term is often used pejoratively, particularly within modernist discourse. I can provide full citations if anybody wants to use this material. The first paragraph of the article as it stands strikes me as particularly bad. I doubt the average reader comes away from that first sentence with any idea of what "historicism" is. I think the first sentence should mimic the first from the Oxford Companion to Philosophy ' s entry, i.e., make it clear that there are several different definitions of "historicism". Srnec (talk) 02:00, 9 August 2017 (UTC)

Anthropological historicism page
Historicism – Anthropology (ua.edu) may help. I am not the first to suggest that, due to differences in "historiography" hisoricism and 'anthropology' historicism, the latter deserves a page to itself FatalSubjectivities (talk) 16:44, 1 February 2023 (UTC)

title: Talk:Historicism


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Asahikawa Airport

Asahikawa Airport (旭川空港), is a single-runway regional airport in Hokkaidō, Japan, straddling the cities of Asahikawa and Higashikagura.

History
Planning of the airport began in the late 1950s. The site was chosen in November 1960 and received government approval in 1963. Japan Domestic Airlines began the first scheduled flight to Asahikawa on July 1, 1966, a NAMC YS-11 service to Haneda Airport via Okadama Airport. Scheduled service was seasonal (May through October) until 1970, when year-round flights to Tokyo began.

The airport was closed for expansion work from May 1981 until February 1982, during which time the main runway was extended and widened, from 1,200 x 30 m to 1,640 m x 45 m. A further extension to 2,000 m was completed in November 1982. Following these expansions, jet service began at the airport, beginning with DC-9 and the MD-80 aircraft followed by widebody Airbus A300s beginning in December 1983.

ANA operated the first international charter flight from Asahikawa in 1987. Another runway extension, to 2,500 m, was completed in 1997, and the parallel taxiway opened in 1998.

Hokkaido Air System operated intra-island flights from Asahikawa to Hakodate (1998 to 2013) and Kushiro (1998 to 2008).

Scheduled international service to Seoul began in 2006, using new international facilities in the airport terminal. Asiana Airlines operated this route intermittently until 2011, when international service at Asahikawa was suspended in the wake of the Tohoku earthquake and tsunami. Thereafter, TransAsia Airways served Taipei from 2012 to 2016, and EVA Air served the same route from 2013 to 2015. China Eastern Airlines began service to Beijing and Shanghai in 2014, but ended the Beijing route in 2016 and the Shanghai route in 2017. Tigerair Taiwan served the Taipei route from 2018 to 2020, and Korean Air served Seoul in the summer of 2019 with five flights per week.

In 2016, plans were finalized to build a new 5,700 m2 international terminal to the south of the existing terminal, with a target of 500,000 international passengers per year by 2030. The new terminal opened in November 2018. An international lounge opened in January 2019.

The operating rights to Asahikawa Airport, along with six other airports in Hokkaido, were acquired by Hokkaido Airports Co., Ltd. in January 2020. Later that year, the COVID-19 pandemic ended all international service at the airport and cut domestic traffic by 82%, as of September 2020.

Access
Asahikawa Airport is accessible by bus from Asahikawa Station, Asahiyama Zoo, and Furano Station. From Asahikawa Station it is about 15 km (35 minutes by bus) while from Furano Station it is about 40 km (1 hour by bus).

title: Asahikawa Airport


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Percy Pilcher

Percy Sinclair Pilcher (16 January 1867 – 2 October 1899) was a British inventor and pioneer aviator who was his country's foremost experimenter in unpowered flight near the end of the nineteenth century.

After corresponding with Otto Lilienthal, Pilcher had considerable success with developing hang gliders. In 1895, he made repeated flights in the Bat, and in 1896–1897 many flights in the Hawk culminated in a world distance record.

By 1899, Pilcher had produced a motor-driven triplane, which he planned to test at Stanford Hall in Leicestershire on September 30, 1899; however, the attempt was delayed by mechanical problems. When he substituted a flight of Hawk, it suffered structural failure in mid-air and he was fatally injured in the resulting crash, with his powered aircraft never having been tested.

Research carried out by Cranfield University in the early 2000s concluded that Pilcher's triplane was more or less workable, and would have been capable of flight with design modifications. This raised the possibility that Pilcher could have been the first to fly a heavier-than-air powered aircraft had he survived.

Early life
Percy Pilcher was born in Bath in 1867, the son of Thomas Webb Pilcher (1799–1874) and a Scottish mother Sophia (née) Robinson. In 1880, at age 13 Pilcher became a cadet in the Royal Navy, and served for seven years. Thereafter he became an engineering apprentice with the shipbuilders, Randolph, Elder and Company, of Govan in Glasgow.

Aviation career
In 1891 Pilcher began work as assistant lecturer at Glasgow University and took a growing interest in aviation. He built a hang glider called The Bat which he flew for the first time in 1895; Later that year Pilcher met Otto Lilienthal, who was the leading expert in gliding in Germany. These discussions led to Pilcher building two more gliders, The Beetle and The Gull. Based on the work of his mentor Otto Lilienthal, in 1895–1896 Pilcher built a glider called Hawk with which he broke the world distance record when he flew 250 m (820 ft) in 1897 on the grounds of Stanford Hall, Leicestershire. His sister Ella Pilcher was involved with his work, stitching the fabric wings of his planes and assisting with his experiments and test flights. She appears in photos taken at the time of Pilcher's public flights.

Pilcher set his sights on making powered flights. He developed a triplane that was to include a 4 hp (3 kW) engine. In order to develop a suitable internal combustion engine to power the aircraft, Pilcher teamed up with the motor engineer Walter Gordon Wilson, and created a company called Wilson-Pilcher. Wilson was later to become credited by the 1919 Royal Commission on Awards to Inventors as the co-inventor of the tank, along with Sir William Tritton. However, construction of the triplane put him heavily into debt, and Pilcher needed sponsorship to complete his work.

Death
On 30 September 1899, having completed his triplane, he had intended to demonstrate it to a group of onlookers and potential sponsors, including the eminent Member of Parliament John Henniker Heaton, in a field near Stanford Hall. However, days before, the engine crankshaft had broken and, so as not to disappoint his guests, he decided to fly the Hawk instead. The weather was stormy and rainy, but by 4 pm Pilcher decided the weather was good enough to fly. The canvas on the wings of the Hawk had become saturated by rain; unbeknown to Pilcher, this caused the fabric to contract putting excessive strain on the bamboo frame: Whilst in mid-air, the tail snapped and Pilcher plunged 10 metres (30 ft) to the ground: he died two days later from his injuries, having never regained consciousness, with his triplane having never been publicly flown.

He is buried in Brompton Cemetery, west London.

Legacy
The damaged Hawk was given to the Aeronautical Society of Great Britain which exhibited it in that state, then in 1909 it was restored and given on loan to the Royal Scottish Museum in Chambers Street (now the main part of the National Museum of Scotland) which put the glider on display. It was on temporary loan to the 1911 Scottish Exhibition of National History, Art and Industry, when a November storm caused damage to the building, and to the glider which was repaired before being put on display again in the museum. During World War II it was put in storage. The fabric wings deteriorated, and restoration work was carried out by the Shuttleworth Trust. Pilcher's Hawk was again put back on display in the museum. In 1985 this became part of National Museums Scotland, and the Hawk became part of the collection of its National Museum of Flight at East Fortune. Further major conservation work was completed in the summer of 2016, and it is back again on display in its usual place, suspended above the atrium of the Science and Technology galleries of the National Museum of Scotland.

A stone monument to Pilcher stands in the field near Stanford Hall at the point where he crashed, and a full-sized replica of his Hawk glider is also displayed at Stanford Hall.

Pilcher is one of the unsuccessful aviation pioneers mentioned in the Marc Blitzstein composition The Airborne Symphony.

In 2011 he was one of seven inaugural inductees to the Scottish Engineering Hall of Fame.

Modern research
Pilcher's plans were lost for many years, and his name was also long forgotten except by a few enthusiasts. When the centenary of the Wright brothers' flight approached, a new effort was made to find the lost work, and some correspondence was found in a private American collection. From this it was possible to discern the general direction of his plans and the basis of his design. Based on Lilienthal's work, Pilcher understood how to produce lift using winglike structures, but at this time a full mathematical description was years away, so many elements were still missing.

In particular, Pilcher was stuck trying to design a wing that could lift the weight of an engine, the aircraft itself and the occupant – each increase in wing area increased the weight so much that yet more lift was required, requiring a larger wing – a seemingly vicious circle. Pilcher's breakthrough, thanks to correspondence with another pioneer, Octave Chanute, was to stack smaller, lighter wings one atop the other in an arrangement we know today as the biplane or triplane. This allowed the wings to generate much more lift without a corresponding increase in weight.

In 2003, a research effort carried out at the School of Aeronautics at Cranfield University, commissioned by the BBC2 television series Horizon, has shown that Pilcher's design was more or less workable, and had he been able to develop his engine, it is possible he would have succeeded in being the first to fly a heavier-than-air powered aircraft with some degree of control. Cranfield built a full-sized working replica of Pilcher's aircraft, but, based on wind tunnel tests with a scale model, they made several alterations to Pilcher's original designs, which they speculated Pilcher would have made, including filling in cut-away sections of the wings to increase the wing area, and therefore lift, and adding a swinging seat to aid control of the aircraft through shifting body weight; a refinement developed by Octave Chanute, which they believed Pilcher would have been aware of. They also added the Wright brothers' innovation of wing-warping as a safety backup for roll control. Pilcher's original design did not include aerodynamic controls such as ailerons or elevators. After a very short initial test flight piloted by the aircraft designer Bill Brookes, the craft achieved a sustained flight of 1 minute and 25 seconds, compared to 59 seconds for the Wright Brothers' best flight at Kitty Hawk in North Carolina. This was achieved under dead calm conditions as an additional safety measure; the Wrights in 1903 flew in a 20 mph+ wind to achieve sufficient airspeed.

A monument to Percy Pilcher is located at Upper Austin Lodge to the south of Eynsford, Kent. He regularly flew his Hawk glider from this location.

title: Percy Pilcher


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Air Srpska

Air Srpska was an airline of the Republika Srpska, Bosnia and Herzegovina. The airline existed from 1999 to 2003.

Fleet
The Air Srpska fleet consisted of two ATR 72 turboprop aircraft leased from Jat Airways.

title: Air Srpska


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Kielce Voivodeship

Kielce Voivodeship (województwo kieleckie) is a former unit of administrative division and the local government in Poland. It was originally formed during Poland's return to independence in the aftermath of World War One, and recreated within the new Polish borders after the defeat of Nazi Germany in World War Two.

1921-1938
Kielce Voivodeship was a unit of administrative division and local government in Poland in years 1921-1939. Back then, it covered a large chunk of central part of the country, including such cities as Radom, Częstochowa and Sosnowiec. On 1 April 1938 its borders changed, see: Territorial changes of Polish Voivodeships on 1 April 1938).

After the change, Voivodeship's area was 22,204 square kilometers, with the population of 2,671,000. Between 1 April 1938 - 1 September 1939 it consisted of 18 powiats (counties). These were:

 * Będzin county,
 * Częstochowa county,
 * city of Częstochowa county (powiat czestochowski grodzki),
 * Iłża county,
 * Jędrzejów county,
 * Kielce county,
 * Kozienice county,
 * Miechów county,
 * Olkusz county,
 * Opatów county,
 * Pińczów county,
 * Radom county,
 * city of Radom county (powiat radomski grodzki),
 * Sandomierz county,
 * city of Sosnowiec county (powiat sosnowiecki grodzki),
 * Stopnica county,
 * Włoszczowa county,
 * Zawiercie county.

Capital city: Kielce. According to the 1931 Polish census, the largest cities in Kielce Voivodeship were:

 * Częstochowa (pop. 117 200),
 * Sosnowiec (pop. 109 000),
 * Radom (pop. 77 900),
 * Kielce (pop. 58 200),
 * Będzin (pop. 47 600),
 * Dąbrowa Górnicza (pop. 36 900),
 * Zawiercie (pop. 32 900),
 * Ostrowiec Świętokrzyski (pop. 25 900).

1945-1975
Kielce Voivodeship was a unit of administrative division and local government in Poland in years 1945–1975. It was downsized in 1975, with parts of its territory going to Radom Voivodeship and partly Tarnobrzeg Voivodeship.

Capital city: Kielce

1975-1998
In years 1975–1998, superseded by Świętokrzyskie Voivodeship.

Capital city: Kielce

Major cities and towns: (population in 1995):
 * Kielce (213,700);
 * Ostrowiec Świętokrzyski (79,200);
 * Starachowice (57,500);
 * Skarżysko-Kamienna (51,400);
 * Końskie (22,300).

title: Kielce Voivodeship


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Planetary (comics)

Planetary is an American comic book series created by writer Warren Ellis and artist John Cassaday, and published by the Wildstorm imprint of DC Comics. After an initial preview issue in September 1998, the series ran for 27 issues from April 1999 to October 2009.

Publication history
Planetary was previewed in issue #33 of Gen13 and issue #6 of C-23, both dated September 1998. The first issue of the series was cover-dated April 1999. Originally intended to be a 24-issue bi-monthly series, the series was on hold from 2001 to 2003 due to illness of writer Warren Ellis and other commitments by Cassaday. Laura Martin (also credited as Laura DePuy) colored almost every issue of the series. The series recommenced in 2004 and concluded with issue #27 in October 2009.

Ellis intended the focus of the book to be the superhero genre, rather than the superheroes themselves: "I wanted to do something that actually went deeper into the subgenre, exposed its roots and showed its branches" and stated in his proposal for the comic series: "[...] What if you had a hundred years of superhero history just slowly leaking out into this young and modern superhero world of the Wildstorm Universe? What if you could take everything old and make it new again?"

Rich Kreiner described John Cassaday's artwork in The Comics Journal as being "close to the gold standard for fabulous realism in mainstream comics". Tom Underhill noted colorist Laura Martin's contribution as "every bit as compelling" as Cassaday's in his review for The Comics Journal.

One of the main features of the series is the portrayal of alternate versions of many figures from popular culture, such as Godzilla, Tarzan, Sherlock Holmes, and Doc Savage. This extends to comic book characters from both DC Comics (e.g. Superman, Green Lantern, and Wonder Woman) and Marvel Comics (e.g. the Fantastic Four, the Hulk, and Thor).

Ellis also introduced the concept of a multiverse to the series, drawing upon the mathematical concept known as the Monster group for inspiration. The multiverse is described as "a theoretical snowflake existing in 196,833 dimensional space", a reference to the visualization method used by some mathematicians when describing the Monster group.

Plot
In 1999, Elijah Snow, a reclusive centenarian and past adventurer with cryokinesis powers, reluctantly accepts recruitment by the field team of Planetary, an organization that investigates the "secret history" of the twentieth century. The field team, also made up of superhuman Jakita Wagner and a technopath called only the Drummer, is supported by a network of global offices, specialists, and equipment, and unconditionally funded by an unidentified, unseen patron called the "Fourth Man." On their missions, the field team encounter concepts from speculative fiction in the flesh, such as pulp magazine heroes, superheroes, kaiju, wuxia and gun fu, a superspy, B movie monsters, Jules Verne's imaginary technology, and interstellar starships. The team embraces the fantastical nature of their findings, embodied by the mantra: "It's a strange world; let's keep it that way."

Restless after several missions spent passively observing, Snow grows proactive, committing Planetary support to crew a stranded interdimensional "shiftship." He also becomes invested in Planetary's goal to liberate life-saving technology and wonders plundered as trophies by the Four—a superpowered rival group—through decades of black operations and wanton atrocities, and to recover and assist the Four's prisoners and experimental subjects. Snow is gradually disquieted by gaps in his own knowledge, which disadvantage him against the Four as well as his teammates.

Aided by secret agent John Stone, Snow regains many lost memories, including various secret adventures he documented in a publication called the Planetary Guide. He remembers that he himself is the Fourth Man, but, when the field team was captured by the Four, he submitted to memory blocks and exile by their leader, Randall Dowling, in exchange for the team's lives. Fearing the Four's reprisal, the team had sought to return Snow to the field without disturbing his memory blocks. Snow also remembers former team member Ambrose Chase, able to alter the laws of physics inside a limited field, who was seemingly fatally shot by a Dowling operative but inexplicably vanished, leaving no body.

Re-assuming leadership, Snow actively opposes the Four, thwarting their plans and turning their allies before targeting their members outright: he captures and tortures William Leather, and sacrifices the observation of a unique extraterrestrial object to permanently strand Jacob Greene off-planet. Wagner is alienated by Snow's seemingly vindictive turn, but the Drummer, who was rescued by Snow from the Four, and who knows that Snow saved Wagner as a baby, trusts that his goal is to save lives above all.

After the field team evades an orbital death ray attack by the Four, they subdue Stone, who was outed by Leather as the Four's informant. Stone reveals the Four's true goal: to eliminate resistance against future invasion by a hostile parallel Earth, as payment for granting their superpowers. Snow contacts Dowling and demands the Four's entire database of knowledge, and their capitulation, in exchange for sparing their lives, despite seemingly possessing no weapon as leverage.

Bemused, the remaining members of the Four, Dowling and Kim Süskind, meet Snow at his chosen location. After securing the Four's database but not their surrender, Snow launches the now-crewed shiftship, long buried underground, opening a vast chasm and dropping Dowling and Süskind to their deaths. Snow visits the hostile Earth by shiftship and, to deter their invasion, issues an ultimatum threatening their annihilation.

Planetary deploys the recovered technology worldwide non-commercially, greatly advancing scientific and humanitarian progress. Meanwhile, theorizing that Chase is alive but suspended in a field of stopped time, Snow orders the construction of a time machine to collapse the field by a frame-dragging effect, overruling the Drummer's fear that, according to quantum mechanics, the advent of time travel would predetermine the entire future timeline by wave function collapse. However, Snow personally turns on the time machine, and his intent to keep the world strange, exerted by the observer effect, manifests many timelines instead of one: while Chase is retrieved and successfully triaged, numerous versions of the field team all arrive from different futures, promising yet more adventures to come.

Outsiders
The 2023-24 DC Comics series Outsiders, written by Jackson Lanzing and Collin Kelly, revived the premise of Planetary in the DC Universe: the DC characters Luke Fox and Batwoman, teaming with a woman identifying as the Drummer, embark on missions to investigate the DC Universe's secret history, embodied by its many continuity reboots. The new Drummer reveals herself to be Jakita Wagner, the sole survivor of the Planetary continuity becoming erased in one such reboot.

Collected editions
The series, and spin-offs, have been collected into a number of volumes:

 * Planetary:
 * Volume 1: All Over the World and Other Stories (collects Preview & #1–6; hardcover and softcover ISBN 1-56389-648-6)
 * Volume 2: The Fourth Man (collects #7–12; hardcover and softcover ISBN 1-56389-764-4)
 * Volume 3: Leaving the 20th Century (collects #13–18; hardcover ISBN 1-4012-0293-4 and softcover ISBN 1-4012-0294-2)
 * Volume 4: Spacetime Archaeology (collects #19–27; hardcover ISBN 1-4012-0996-3 and softcover ISBN 1-4012-2345-1)
 * Planetary: Crossing Worlds (collects the three crossover one-shots above; softcover only ISBN 1-4012-0279-9)
 * Planetary Book One (collects #1–14, Planetary Sneak Peek, and Planetary/The Authority: Ruling the World; also script to #1, character design sketches) ISBN 1-4012-7166-9) (July 2017) (softcover)
 * Planetary Book Two (collects #15–27, Planetary/JLA: Terra Occulta, and Planetary/Batman: Night on Earth) ISBN 1-4012-7799-3) (March 2018) (softcover)
 * Absolute Planetary volume 1 (collects Preview & #1–12, also script to #1; slipcased hardcover ISBN 1-4012-0327-2)
 * Absolute Planetary volume 2 (collects #13–27; slipcased hardcover ISBN 1-4012-2701-5)
 * The Planetary Omnibus (collects Preview, #1–27, plus the three crossover one-shots above, also script to #1, character design sketches, and cover art for both Absolute Editions and the four trade paperbacks); hardcover only ISBN 1-4012-4238-3)

Awards

 * 2000:
 * Nominated for "Best Continuing Series" Eisner Award
 * Nominated for "Best New Series" Eisner Award
 * 2002: Nominated for "Best Continuing Series" Eisner Award
 * 2005: Nominated for "Best Serialized Story" Eisner Award, for Planetary #19–20 ("Mystery in Space/Rendezvous")

title: Planetary (comics)