Arizona

Name: Death at Papago Park POW Camp
Brand: Jane Eppinga
SKU: 9781467135764
Price: 16.49 USD
Availability: InStock

Starry skies leap into closer proximity at the Lowell Observatory in Flagstaff. And the past comes into equally stark focus through the lens of our Arizona history books. Direct your gaze to the pioneers of early Tucson before water began trickling into Flowing Wells. The relief of a tuberculosis patient finding sanctuary with Sunnyslope’s Desert Mission. A twitchy trigger finger in Tombstone’s O.K. Corral. The widened eyes of a motorist zipping by the Grand Canyon. All rendered in our Arizona catalogue with the clarity of Sedona’s red rocks on a cloudless day. [View all Arizona books]

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Death at Papago Park POW Camp

Paperback

$21.99 $16.49 Save 25%

Luke Air Force Base

Paperback

$24.99 $18.74 Save 25%

Yuma Proving Ground

Paperback

$23.99 $17.99 Save 25%

The Cadet Nurse Corps in Arizona

Paperback

$21.99 $16.49 Save 25%

Death at Papago Park POW Camp

9781467135764

$21.99 $16.49 Save 25%

This WWII true crime history reveals a shocking story of murder inside an Arizona POW camp—and the U.S. military’s controversial response.

Though Arizona was far from any theater of battle during World War II, the grim realities of combat were brought home with the construction of POW camps. Located outside Phoenix, Camp Papago Park became famous for its prisoners’ attempted escape through the Faustball Tunnel, but it also had a dark reputation of violence among its prisoners.

One casualty was Werner Drechsler, a prisoner who supplied German secrets to U.S. Navy authorities. Nazis held at Papago Park labeled him a traitor and hanged him from a bathroom rafter. Controversy erupted over whether the killing was an act of war or murder. Some also questioned the lack of protection Drechsler received for aiding in espionage. Ultimately, seven POWs were hanged for the crime.

Author Jane Eppinga examines the tangled details and implications of America’s last mass execution.

Luke Air Force Base

9781467104708

$24.99 $18.74 Save 25%

Luke Air Force Base, created in less than a year from desert scrub and farmland, stands some 20 miles west of Phoenix. On March 31, 1941, months before the United States entered World War II, construction began. That summer, the Army Air Corps named Luke Field after World War I hero and triple ace Frank Luke Jr. Some pilots from Luke Field’s first class flew from airfields in Hawaii during the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. From the beginning, Luke Field trained fighter pilots, as it does today. Over the years, Luke Air Force Base was home to 14 primary fighter aircraft, graduated over 60,000 students, and accounted for millions of training flight hours. Of the pilots who trained at Luke Field, a number became aces, including the all-time US leading ace, Maj. Richard I. Bong. For decades, Luke Air Force Base has been home to more fighter aircraft than any other base in the United States, earning the moniker “Fighter Country.”

Yuma Proving Ground

9781467104500

$23.99 $17.99 Save 25%

The Yuma Proving Ground’s early history began in 1849 with the establishment of Army outposts in the region.

When the United States entered World War II in 1942, the Army established a large-scale training center that expanded from eastern California into western Arizona. Gen. George S.Patton Jr. was assigned to develop the Desert Training Center as a location to train personnel and test equipment in the harsh desert for the war effort. As part of the Desert Training Center, Camp Laguna and the Yuma Test Branch were founded to conduct specific training and testing in support of the war effort. In 1951, the Yuma Test Branch was renamed the Yuma Test Station, and by 1957, the Army began training personnel on military freefall.In 1963, the Army renamed the Yuma Test Station as the Yuma Proving Ground. Today, the Yuma Proving Ground stands near the original sites with the continued task of testing equipment and training personnel.

Lt. Col. Scott Laverty is a 29-year veteran of the US Army Reserves and holds a graduate degree in military history. He has drawn on the archives of the Yuma Proving Ground Heritage Center, the General Patton Memorial Museum, the Yuma Quartermaster Depot Historic Park, the Yuma County Library District’s Heritage Library, and various other museums and archives to provide this historical account of the fascinating history of the Army’s Yuma Proving Ground.

The Cadet Nurse Corps in Arizona

9781467118255

$21.99 $16.49 Save 25%

Congress established the U.S. Cadet Nurse Corps during World War II to meet the high demand for medical care. The first federal women's education program, it included a nondiscrimination policy decades before the civil rights movement. The trailblazing cadets and innovative healthcare practices at the five participating teaching hospitals in Arizona left a lasting national legacy. Sage Memorial Hospital was the country's only accredited nursing school for Native Americans. Santa Monica's Hospital and nursing school was the first to integrate west of the Mississippi. The daughter of a Navajo medicine man, U.S. Army Nurse Corps second lieutenant Adele Slivers helped bridge a gap between traditional healing practices and modern medicine. Arizona author Elsie Szecsy details momentous local challenges and achievements from this pivotal era in American medicine.