David Williams is the Executive Director of the Hydroplane and Raceboat Museum near Seattle. He has been involved in powerboat racing his whole life. Through his work with the Museum, he has restored over a dozen famous race boats and has become one of the world's foremost authorities on powerboat racing. He has been driving race boats for over 45 years and was the primary stunt driver for MGM powerboat-themed film Madison. He has written extensively about motorsports and aviation. The William E Boeing Story is his tenth book.
The book, which took Williams four years to write, is full of bootleggers, kidnappers and political run-ins, and covers every aspect of early aviation, from Boeing s first ride in a balloon in 1896 to the Dash 80 jet in 1955. The William Boeing Story: A Gift of Flight is written in 70 short chapters. Williams chuckles, explaining that a close friend told him, I read to fall asleep, so if you keep your chapters to about 10 minutes, that would be great. Williams did so. Bill Boeing was not creating this company for money, but because he felt it was the right thing at the right time. People weren t working for Bill in employer relationships. They were a group of friends trying to build something better, and that led to the largest aerospace company in the world, Williams says. Patti Payne, Puget Sound Business Journal