The book, Flight Of The Vin Fiz represents a thorough account of the adventures of Calbraith "Cal" P. Rodgers in the grand coast-to-coast $50,000 air race held in 1911.  Forgotten in annals of early aviation history, the first air crossing of the United States occurred less than eight years after the Wright Brothers first flight in December 1903 over the sand dunes of Kitty Hawk North Carolina.  Newspaper publisher and tycoon William Randolf Hearst financed this cross-country aerial spectacle.  The Vin Fiz soft drink company who felt it would be the “greatest scheme in American business annals” financed the aircraft flown by Cal Rodgers.  "Vin Fiz" was a grape drink that was struggling in the marketplace and in desperation the company thought that sponsoring Cal Rodgers' attempt to fly across North America, if successful, would create excitement for its product.  Aside from the aircraft itself, the Vin Fiz soft-drink company also leased from Pullman Company, a dedicated railroad car that could carry Cal Rodgers' wife, mother, a crew of ten mechanics, spare parts along with a host of reporters and officials.  Along the way Rodger's aircraft was hit by lightning, attacked by a bull in an Indiana pasture and hounded by crowds that darkened its wings with autographs.  While the trip was suppose to be completed within 30 days, it took over 84 days, covered 4,231 miles between New York and Los Angeles and included stops in no less than 75 cities, towns and villages along the way.  In "Flight Of The Vin Fiz" the author has retraced the original path of the Vin Fiz, interviewed hundreds of surviving eyewitnesses and uncovered newspaper files and primary-source documents of the time.  Taken in its entirety, "Flight Of The Vin Fiz" succeeds in re-creating an authentic account of Cal Rodgers' successful flight, a feat arguably greater than Charles Lindbergh's crossing of the Atlantic Ocean 16 years later.  The major sections of "Flight Of The Vin Fiz" are as follows: 1) Preface; 2) Chapter 1 - Sheepshead Bay - Up And Away; 3) Chapter 2 - Love At First Flight; 4) Chapter 3 - Middletown And Mother; 5) Chapter 4 - Big Man, Big White Bird; 6) Chapter 5 - O, Hi, Ohio And Windy Bird; 7) Chapter 6 - The Great Chicago Air Race; 8) Chapter 7 - A New World Record; 9) Chapter 8 - Katy All The Way; 10) Chapter 9 - Down By The Rio Grande; 11) Chapter 10 - Rodgerses And Perrys - Heritage Of Valor; 12) Chapter 11 - Triumph At Pasadena; 13) Chapter 12 Coast To Coast And Beyond; 14) Epilogue; 15) Appendix A - Official Log Of The Vin Fiz; 16) Appendix B - Maps; 17) Appendix C - Statistics; 18) Appendix D - Notes Ex Post Facto; 19) Appendix E - Postmortems and 20) Acknowledgements.  In addition to an informative narrative, "Flight Of The Vin Fiz" includes the following features: 1) Approximately 44 black and white vintage photographs and 2) About 8 maps.  This book is 351 pages and is in excellent condition.  The author is E.P. Stein.  Edition published in 1985.