Charles E 'Chuck' Yeager will always be remembered as the first man to exceed Mach 1 - and as one of the pilots immortalised for having the 'right stuff. In fact, according to author Tom Wolfe who coined the phrase, Yeager was "the most righteous of all the possessors of the right stuff". Yeager was born on February 13, 1923, in West Virginia and grew up in Hamlin, a tiny town in one of the poorest areas of the US state. The young Yeager acquired a keen understanding of machinery from his father. Chuck wasn't one of those young lads of the period who dreamt of being a flyboy; his life revolved around the outdoors. As early as the age of six, he was shooting squirrels and rabbits with a .22 rifle and skinning them for his mother to cook for dinner.
展开▼
