Free Republic

"Jimmy Stewart, Bomber Pilot" by Starr Smith Sixty-some years ago, when President Franklin Roosevelt declared war on Germany and Japan, almost every American who was able became involved. Some left their children at home in the effort to make planes and ships in factories. Some left their families and traveled across the country and across the world. One left an Academy Award-winning career to do something that he felt he needed to do, and in "Jimmy Stewart, Bomber Pilot" by Starr Smith (c.2005, Zenith Press), you'll read about that man and his heroism. James Maitland Stewart was born on May...

MONTEREY, Calif. (AP) - Rex Simpson Hardy, one of Life magazine's first photographers and later a naval pilot during World War II, has died. He was 88. Hardy died of cancer on April 7 in Monterey, Calif., according to his son, Tom. One of a handful of photographers hired by Life magazine in 1936 for its first year of publication, Hardy gained attention for an Aug. 22, 1938 cover photo of Ginger Rogers dancing with Fred Astaire. He went on to photograph many Hollywood stars, including Harpo Marx, James Stewart, Robert Taylor, Gary Cooper, Joan Crawford and Clark Gable. Some...