The story of the United States Transcontinental Air Mail Service, the
first of its kind in the world, is one of romanticism and danger.
Through calm or storm, in light or dark, a contingent of courageous
couriers relayed the public mail across three thousand miles in less
than a day and a half--faster than ever before. Though the U.S. Air Mail
Service began on the East Coast, some of the frontier tales of the route
through the Rocky Mountains were lost. The western leg of the airmail
service from Chicago to San Francisco included the Mountain Division,
headquartered in Cheyenne, Wyoming. The route through Wyoming,
considered the most treacherous, provided harrowing tales of the pilots
who risked their lives. Authors Starley Talbott and Michael Kassel
lionize these folk heroes, aviation legends and icons of western
history.