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The Skies Belong to Us: Love and Terror in the Golden Age of Hijacking
Goodreads Choice Award
Nominee for Readers' Favorite History & Biography (2013)In an America torn apart by the Vietnam War and the demise of sixties idealism, airplane hijackings were astonishingly routine. Over a five-year period starting in 1968, the desperate and disillusioned seized commercial jets nearly once a week, using guns, bombs, and jars of acid. Some hijackers wished to escape to foreign lands, where they imagined being hailed as heroes; others aimed to swap hostages for sacks of cash. Their criminal exploits mesmerized the country, never more so than when the young lovers at the heart of Brendan I. Koerner's "The Skies Belong to Us" pulled off the longest-distance hijacking in American history.
A shattered Army veteran and a mischievous party girl, Roger Holder and Cathy Kerkow commandeered Western Airlines Flight 701 as a vague protest against the war. Through a combination of savvy and dumb luck, the couple managed to flee across an ocean with a half-million dollars in ransom, a feat that made them notorious around the globe. Koerner spent four years chronicling this madcap tale, which involves a cast of characters ranging from exiled Black Panthers to African despots to French movie stars. He combed through over 4,000 declassified documents and interviewed scores of key figures in the drama--including one of the hijackers, whom Koerner discovered living in total obscurity. Yet "The Skies Belong to Us" is more than just an enthralling yarn about a spectacular heist and its bittersweet, decades-long aftermath. It is also a psychological portrait of America at its most turbulent, and a testament to the madness that can grip a nation when politics fail.
A shattered Army veteran and a mischievous party girl, Roger Holder and Cathy Kerkow commandeered Western Airlines Flight 701 as a vague protest against the war. Through a combination of savvy and dumb luck, the couple managed to flee across an ocean with a half-million dollars in ransom, a feat that made them notorious around the globe. Koerner spent four years chronicling this madcap tale, which involves a cast of characters ranging from exiled Black Panthers to African despots to French movie stars. He combed through over 4,000 declassified documents and interviewed scores of key figures in the drama--including one of the hijackers, whom Koerner discovered living in total obscurity. Yet "The Skies Belong to Us" is more than just an enthralling yarn about a spectacular heist and its bittersweet, decades-long aftermath. It is also a psychological portrait of America at its most turbulent, and a testament to the madness that can grip a nation when politics fail.
336 pages, Kindle Edition
First published June 18, 2013
175 people are currently reading
8380 people want to read
About the author
Brendan I. Koerner
8 books103 followersBrendan I. Koerner is a contributing editor at Wired and the author of The Skies Belong to Us and Now the Hell Will Start, the latter of which he is currently adapting for filmmaker Spike Lee. A former columnist for both The New York Times and Slate who was named one of Columbia Journalism Review’s “Ten Young Writers on the Rise,” he has also written for Harper’s, The New York Times Magazine, ESPN the Magazine, and many other publications. Visit him at www.microkhan.com and follow him at @brendankoerner.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 593 reviews
January 16, 2013
A man should take pride in his work.
August 9, 2013
Brendan Koerner has just written one of the most fascinating books I've read in a long time. The Skies Belong to Us: Love and Terror in the Golden Age of Hijacking (Crown, 2013) recounts some of the more memorable US hijackings between 1961 and 1972. Hijacking became a real problem starting in 1967, culminating in a tumultuous year in 1972 when almost 100 US airliners were highjacked, sometimes two in one day.
But the main story of Koerner's book is that of traumatized Vietnam vet, Roger Holder, and California beauty, Cathy Kerkow. The two made a stunning couple: he a tall African-American vet and she a fun-loving white woman. Both were in their early 20s.
Holder felt betrayed by his country for allowing him to fight in Vietnam and then discard him like a piece of garbage. Kerkow was drawn to Holder's story and mesmerized by his bookish and charismatic demeanor. The two realized they had met over a decade ago in a small town up in Oregon when they were children. Holder, who had taken up astrology after returning from Vietnam, was certain he and Kerkow were destined to be together.
And together they hijacked a Western Airlines flight, demanding half a million dollars and a larger plane to take them to Hanoi. They received the money and the larger plane, but at the last minute Holder changed their destination to Algiers.
The story gets even more fascinating from there. A writer of fiction couldn't come up with a more spellbinding tale of love, terror, international relations, and domestic turmoil.
Back to the airlines in the 1970s. The US government was determined to enact security measures at airports, but the airline industry lobby in Washington, DC resisted. For years during the height of these hijackings, airports still didn't have any security in place. The airlines were worried about delays, turning off customers, and the cost of x-ray machines and metal detectors.
By the end of 1972, the government realized something had to change. So in early January 1973, airports started to use x-ray machines and metal detectors. And suddenly the number of hijackings was reduced to nothing for a couple of years. Apart from a brief resurgence of hijackings to Cuba in 1980 and 1981, the turbulent skies all but settled down until 9/11.
The story of Holder and Kerkow, plus the history of hijackings in the US, make for a page-turning book.
But the main story of Koerner's book is that of traumatized Vietnam vet, Roger Holder, and California beauty, Cathy Kerkow. The two made a stunning couple: he a tall African-American vet and she a fun-loving white woman. Both were in their early 20s.
Holder felt betrayed by his country for allowing him to fight in Vietnam and then discard him like a piece of garbage. Kerkow was drawn to Holder's story and mesmerized by his bookish and charismatic demeanor. The two realized they had met over a decade ago in a small town up in Oregon when they were children. Holder, who had taken up astrology after returning from Vietnam, was certain he and Kerkow were destined to be together.
And together they hijacked a Western Airlines flight, demanding half a million dollars and a larger plane to take them to Hanoi. They received the money and the larger plane, but at the last minute Holder changed their destination to Algiers.
The story gets even more fascinating from there. A writer of fiction couldn't come up with a more spellbinding tale of love, terror, international relations, and domestic turmoil.
Back to the airlines in the 1970s. The US government was determined to enact security measures at airports, but the airline industry lobby in Washington, DC resisted. For years during the height of these hijackings, airports still didn't have any security in place. The airlines were worried about delays, turning off customers, and the cost of x-ray machines and metal detectors.
By the end of 1972, the government realized something had to change. So in early January 1973, airports started to use x-ray machines and metal detectors. And suddenly the number of hijackings was reduced to nothing for a couple of years. Apart from a brief resurgence of hijackings to Cuba in 1980 and 1981, the turbulent skies all but settled down until 9/11.
The story of Holder and Kerkow, plus the history of hijackings in the US, make for a page-turning book.
February 2, 2019
"I want $200,000 in unmarked 20-dollar bills. I want two back parachutes and two front parachutes. When we land, I want a fuel truck ready to refuel. No funny stuff or I’ll do the job.” D. B. Cooper
In the 1960's and 1970's, epidemic plane hijackings were an American spectator sport and the plane hijackers became folk heroes. Case in point was “ D. B. Cooper,” an unidentified man who hijacked a Boeing 727 aircraft in the airspace between Portland, Oregon, and Seattle, Washington, on November 24, 1971. This case remains the only unsolved skyjacking in the world and the media romanticized it.
“The Skies Belong to Us: Love and Terror in the Golden Age of Hijacking” is the story of how and why plane hijackings became so popular during this time period. The author, Brendan Koerner, does a terrific job telling us the famous story of a disturbed young couple, who took control of a Western Airlines flight and caused the longest-distance skyjacking in American history.
For me, reading about the mindset and motives of both the hitchhikers and the airline industries was the most interesting part of the book. Planes were being hijacked at least once a week and most in the beginning were going to Cuba. Eventually as time went on, this morphed into demands to go to other distant lands and financial gain. The airlines completely folded to the demands of these hijackers, but refused to make flying safer, for fear of scaring off the American public from flying.
For the couple of hijackers in Koerner's book, this passive and accommodating attitude of the airlines, proves to work to their advantage. The pair were Willie Roger Holder and his girlfriend Catherine Marie Kerkow. Holder was a Vietnam vet (who was clearly suffering from PSTD) after he was severely wounded after his M-113 hit a landmine near Loc Ninh in 1967. He met his girlfriend, Catherine, a pretty young hippie who liked to smoke and deal weed when he returned back to the USA. Their deluded fantasy was they would hijack a plane with a fake bomb and demand $500,000 and the freedom of Angela Davis, the onetime UCLA professor then on trial in a Northern California courtroom. Then they'll spirit Davis away to North Vietnam and resettle in the Australian outback and live "happily ever after.” Willie appears to have believed, Koerner writes, that the “resulting media circus would somehow force America to confront the blunt realities” of the Vietnam War.Of course things did not go as planned and they ended up flying across the Atlantic to Algeria. Years later, Willie was eventually caught in 1986 and died of an aneurism in prison in 2012. . Catherine had escaped in France, has never been found and is on the FBI most wanted list for women.The end of the airline industries complacency was when in November 1972, Southern Airlines Flight 48, was hijacked by three men who threatened to crash into the atomic reactor at Oak Ridge National Laboratory in Tennessee.
Things quickly changed after that and airports were no longer like train stations. They started searching the passengers by hand and then eventually the airline industry started using x-ray machines. The American public was relieved and despite the new delays, the wide-spread fears could finally be reduced. In the age of severely heightened airport security and bullet-proof cockpit doors, plane hijackings are rare. This book gives the understanding of the criminal history of just why we all need to stand in our socks waiting in line. Recommended.
In the 1960's and 1970's, epidemic plane hijackings were an American spectator sport and the plane hijackers became folk heroes. Case in point was “ D. B. Cooper,” an unidentified man who hijacked a Boeing 727 aircraft in the airspace between Portland, Oregon, and Seattle, Washington, on November 24, 1971. This case remains the only unsolved skyjacking in the world and the media romanticized it.
“The Skies Belong to Us: Love and Terror in the Golden Age of Hijacking” is the story of how and why plane hijackings became so popular during this time period. The author, Brendan Koerner, does a terrific job telling us the famous story of a disturbed young couple, who took control of a Western Airlines flight and caused the longest-distance skyjacking in American history.
For me, reading about the mindset and motives of both the hitchhikers and the airline industries was the most interesting part of the book. Planes were being hijacked at least once a week and most in the beginning were going to Cuba. Eventually as time went on, this morphed into demands to go to other distant lands and financial gain. The airlines completely folded to the demands of these hijackers, but refused to make flying safer, for fear of scaring off the American public from flying.
For the couple of hijackers in Koerner's book, this passive and accommodating attitude of the airlines, proves to work to their advantage. The pair were Willie Roger Holder and his girlfriend Catherine Marie Kerkow. Holder was a Vietnam vet (who was clearly suffering from PSTD) after he was severely wounded after his M-113 hit a landmine near Loc Ninh in 1967. He met his girlfriend, Catherine, a pretty young hippie who liked to smoke and deal weed when he returned back to the USA. Their deluded fantasy was they would hijack a plane with a fake bomb and demand $500,000 and the freedom of Angela Davis, the onetime UCLA professor then on trial in a Northern California courtroom. Then they'll spirit Davis away to North Vietnam and resettle in the Australian outback and live "happily ever after.” Willie appears to have believed, Koerner writes, that the “resulting media circus would somehow force America to confront the blunt realities” of the Vietnam War.Of course things did not go as planned and they ended up flying across the Atlantic to Algeria. Years later, Willie was eventually caught in 1986 and died of an aneurism in prison in 2012. . Catherine had escaped in France, has never been found and is on the FBI most wanted list for women.The end of the airline industries complacency was when in November 1972, Southern Airlines Flight 48, was hijacked by three men who threatened to crash into the atomic reactor at Oak Ridge National Laboratory in Tennessee.
Things quickly changed after that and airports were no longer like train stations. They started searching the passengers by hand and then eventually the airline industry started using x-ray machines. The American public was relieved and despite the new delays, the wide-spread fears could finally be reduced. In the age of severely heightened airport security and bullet-proof cockpit doors, plane hijackings are rare. This book gives the understanding of the criminal history of just why we all need to stand in our socks waiting in line. Recommended.
July 30, 2013
I thoroughly enjoyed this book. Read it in ~ 3 days sort of like a non-stop versus a layover with connecting flights. If I didn't have to go to work, well, a lot of books would get read a lot quicker!
[As a passenger in ]one of the hijacked planes of that era, I had special interest in the subject . Yes, , 1968, Dec. Phila. to Miami for Christmas vacation detoured to Havana, bussed to the coastal town of Verdero(sp), and flown back to Miami on turbo prop planes , I can vouch for the accuracy of the book's highly detailed and well researched descriptions. I've retold my family's trip many times, even the ironic part when our family friend drove us in to the airport speaking a few phrases in Spanish as a joke because " you could be going to Cuba, signore!" Wonder how he felt afterward. I never did ask.
The book describes many behind the scenes events and maneuverings, such as explanations for the long delay, years, before the FAA finally instituted the kind of security screening that would have stopped so many hijackers who carried weapons on board. These days it's hard to conceive of anyone packing a pistol or carrying nitroglycerin with them, as our man claimed to have when he diverted our plane off course. The later hijackings were more violent and dangerous. In '68 , they were happening with regularity and relative peace. Brendan Koerner has created an informative and exciting read that held my interest to the end. He has a wealth of backstory information to set the stage, interviews to add the personal side to the facts and stylistic aplomb to make it work better than a novel. The events in here are sometimes so incredible that if put into fiction would seem over the top. Facts often trump fiction in my experience.
[As a passenger in ]one of the hijacked planes of that era, I had special interest in the subject . Yes, , 1968, Dec. Phila. to Miami for Christmas vacation detoured to Havana, bussed to the coastal town of Verdero(sp), and flown back to Miami on turbo prop planes , I can vouch for the accuracy of the book's highly detailed and well researched descriptions. I've retold my family's trip many times, even the ironic part when our family friend drove us in to the airport speaking a few phrases in Spanish as a joke because " you could be going to Cuba, signore!" Wonder how he felt afterward. I never did ask.
The book describes many behind the scenes events and maneuverings, such as explanations for the long delay, years, before the FAA finally instituted the kind of security screening that would have stopped so many hijackers who carried weapons on board. These days it's hard to conceive of anyone packing a pistol or carrying nitroglycerin with them, as our man claimed to have when he diverted our plane off course. The later hijackings were more violent and dangerous. In '68 , they were happening with regularity and relative peace. Brendan Koerner has created an informative and exciting read that held my interest to the end. He has a wealth of backstory information to set the stage, interviews to add the personal side to the facts and stylistic aplomb to make it work better than a novel. The events in here are sometimes so incredible that if put into fiction would seem over the top. Facts often trump fiction in my experience.
February 27, 2021
Po této knize jsem pokukoval už když vyšla v polském překladu v nakladatelství Czarne a když loni vyšlo i v češtině u kultovního vydavatelství Absynt, tak jsem si dopřál luxus čtení v rodném jazyce.
— Tato famózní reportážní kniha vypráví o zlatém věku únosů letadel v rámci meziměstských letů v rámci Spojených států.v sedmdesátých letech minulého století. Dnes si ani nedovedeme představit, že do letadla jsi nakráčel jak do motoráku do Horní Dolní. Nikdo vás nekontroloval, žádné bezpečnostní rámy, kámoši vás mohli doprovodit až ke schůdkům do letadlo a i tu letenku jste si mohli nakoupit až na místě. Jelikož ale docházelo k únosům téměř každý den a pilot nikdy nevěděl, zda přistane v Havaně nebo na letišti podle letového řádu. Snahu FBI něco s tím dělat blokovaly lobisté napojení na letecké společnosti, které se báli, že bezpečnostní opatření nejen prodraží provoz aerolinek ale i odradí spoustu svobodymyslných zákazníků od cestování vzduchem.
— Autor z dějin vzdušného pirátství vyzobává ty nejšťavňatější kousky a předkládá nám ty nejsměšnější, nejodvážnější i nejsmolnější únosce a jejich činy. Kromě těchto krátkých mozaikových příběhů, zde autor popisuje i dějiny nejen toho vzdušného pirátství a hlavní a sjednocující linka je příběh milenecké dvojice Rogera Holdera a Catherine Kerkow. Roger byl mladý černoch, který exceloval během války ve Vietnamu ale díky drobnému incidentu, kdy ho náhodou odchytí s trávou jeho kariéra skončí.
— Po návratu do USA se brzy seznámí s mladičkou bílou holkou s hodně svobodumyslnými názory a rychle se z nich stane milenecká dvojice. Holderovi začne trošku strašit ve věži, což vyústí ve společný únos letadla. Únos nakonec dopadne úplně jinak, než byl plán ale policii uniknou. Autor pak ještě dlouho sleduje osudy této dvojice a různých lidí kolem nich.
— Musím konstatovat, že tato kniha byla napsána skvěle, na pozadí příběhu vzdušných Bonnie a Clayda ukazuje proměny světa, politiky a myšlení některých skupin a jedinců. A i když kniha patří do žánru non-fiction, tak se čte jak dobrá detektivka a mohu ji s klidným svědomím doporučit.
— Tato famózní reportážní kniha vypráví o zlatém věku únosů letadel v rámci meziměstských letů v rámci Spojených států.v sedmdesátých letech minulého století. Dnes si ani nedovedeme představit, že do letadla jsi nakráčel jak do motoráku do Horní Dolní. Nikdo vás nekontroloval, žádné bezpečnostní rámy, kámoši vás mohli doprovodit až ke schůdkům do letadlo a i tu letenku jste si mohli nakoupit až na místě. Jelikož ale docházelo k únosům téměř každý den a pilot nikdy nevěděl, zda přistane v Havaně nebo na letišti podle letového řádu. Snahu FBI něco s tím dělat blokovaly lobisté napojení na letecké společnosti, které se báli, že bezpečnostní opatření nejen prodraží provoz aerolinek ale i odradí spoustu svobodymyslných zákazníků od cestování vzduchem.
— Autor z dějin vzdušného pirátství vyzobává ty nejšťavňatější kousky a předkládá nám ty nejsměšnější, nejodvážnější i nejsmolnější únosce a jejich činy. Kromě těchto krátkých mozaikových příběhů, zde autor popisuje i dějiny nejen toho vzdušného pirátství a hlavní a sjednocující linka je příběh milenecké dvojice Rogera Holdera a Catherine Kerkow. Roger byl mladý černoch, který exceloval během války ve Vietnamu ale díky drobnému incidentu, kdy ho náhodou odchytí s trávou jeho kariéra skončí.
— Po návratu do USA se brzy seznámí s mladičkou bílou holkou s hodně svobodumyslnými názory a rychle se z nich stane milenecká dvojice. Holderovi začne trošku strašit ve věži, což vyústí ve společný únos letadla. Únos nakonec dopadne úplně jinak, než byl plán ale policii uniknou. Autor pak ještě dlouho sleduje osudy této dvojice a různých lidí kolem nich.
— Musím konstatovat, že tato kniha byla napsána skvěle, na pozadí příběhu vzdušných Bonnie a Clayda ukazuje proměny světa, politiky a myšlení některých skupin a jedinců. A i když kniha patří do žánru non-fiction, tak se čte jak dobrá detektivka a mohu ji s klidným svědomím doporučit.
December 20, 2020
Zlatá doba vzdušného pirátství, kdy byl na denním pořádku "bezmála jeden únos denně". Protože proč ne, že? Do letadla se dalo dostat se zbraní (žádné kontroly) v podstatě i bez letenky (ty se daly pořídit až na palubě), svět byl plný revolucionářských projevů od Evropy přes Blízký východ až po Ameriku a tak kdokoli kdo ve jménu "proletoriátu, proti Vietnamu, proti kapitalismu" chtěl na sebe/své zájmy upoutat pozornost (či si přijít na nějaký ten dolar), mohl.
Koerner na to nahlíží pohledem aerolinek, které chtěly stůj co stůj zachovat prachy generující status quo, státní správy, veřejného mínění, Castrovým, legislativy a především příběhů únos(c)ů samotných. Umí v každém z těch pohledů najít to podstatné, zajímavé, ironické a někdy i úsměvné.
I to by bohatě stačilo na neskonale zajímavou knihu. Ovšem zde je provázána zastřešujícím příběhem "bonnieclydeovského" dua Holder/Kerkowová. Love story překlopená v procedurální popis jednoho únosu překlopený v politický thriller končící nejednou osobní tragédií. Navíc s dodnes nevyjasněnou záhadou dodávající tomu punc tajemna, že ihned po dočtení půjdete googlit, zda se za ty roky od napsání něco v té věci nezměnilo.
Ano, je v tom vše a je tedy až neuvěřitelné, že se to povedlo skloubit v jeden soudržný celek, který zaujme, něco se dozvíte a nikdy se tu nepřešlapuje na místě. Navíc na ploše, která dovoluje to přečíst za jeden zaoceánský let. Což však s ohledem na téma možná není zase až tak dobrý nápad.
Koerner na to nahlíží pohledem aerolinek, které chtěly stůj co stůj zachovat prachy generující status quo, státní správy, veřejného mínění, Castrovým, legislativy a především příběhů únos(c)ů samotných. Umí v každém z těch pohledů najít to podstatné, zajímavé, ironické a někdy i úsměvné.
I to by bohatě stačilo na neskonale zajímavou knihu. Ovšem zde je provázána zastřešujícím příběhem "bonnieclydeovského" dua Holder/Kerkowová. Love story překlopená v procedurální popis jednoho únosu překlopený v politický thriller končící nejednou osobní tragédií. Navíc s dodnes nevyjasněnou záhadou dodávající tomu punc tajemna, že ihned po dočtení půjdete googlit, zda se za ty roky od napsání něco v té věci nezměnilo.
Ano, je v tom vše a je tedy až neuvěřitelné, že se to povedlo skloubit v jeden soudržný celek, který zaujme, něco se dozvíte a nikdy se tu nepřešlapuje na místě. Navíc na ploše, která dovoluje to přečíst za jeden zaoceánský let. Což však s ohledem na téma možná není zase až tak dobrý nápad.
March 24, 2021
Letos jsem začal trénovat na mistrovství Evropy v pomalém čtení a tak jsem těchto 300 stran četl asi 50 let. Teď teda trochu přehánim, ale na světě to už tak chodí.
Takže o co tady jde? Absynt i tentokrát nezklamal a poučil mne o úskalích a trampotách leteckých únosů sedmdesátých a osmdesátých let 20. století v Americe. Dřív se mohla jít babička s dědou dojít rozloučit až do letadla a mávat za okénkem! To jsem třeba nevěděl a to toho teda vím už hodně!
Logicky to mělo celý i svoje funky stránky. A díky tomu už si člověk sotva vezme pilku na chleba do příručního zavazadla, když letí na služebku. Díky únosci! 8/10.
Takže o co tady jde? Absynt i tentokrát nezklamal a poučil mne o úskalích a trampotách leteckých únosů sedmdesátých a osmdesátých let 20. století v Americe. Dřív se mohla jít babička s dědou dojít rozloučit až do letadla a mávat za okénkem! To jsem třeba nevěděl a to toho teda vím už hodně!
Logicky to mělo celý i svoje funky stránky. A díky tomu už si člověk sotva vezme pilku na chleba do příručního zavazadla, když letí na služebku. Díky únosci! 8/10.
October 27, 2024
za krótkie!!!
June 12, 2013
This book fascinated me from beginning to end. While the focus is on Roger Holder's convoluted and oddly successful plan to skyjack a plane with his lover Cathy Kerkow, the story told is broad and full of wacky, real life characters. As the US stumbled out of Vietnam, the political and social climates were rife with damaged servicemen and angry citizens seeking ways to make a stand. Skyjacking became the perfect outlet for a staggering number of these people.
While the events in this book are only a few decades behind us, much has changed in dramatic ways. I was particularly struck by the airlines' lackadaisical attitude toward security, as well as their vehement opposition to change. Lives were lost and people lived in fear while airline executives and government officials bickered about details and finances.
Koerner has an engaging, conversational writing style that made me feel like he was sitting beside me, telling me a story. This is a nonfiction book that often reads like fiction. At times I had to remind myself that, while crazy, these things did really happen.
While the events in this book are only a few decades behind us, much has changed in dramatic ways. I was particularly struck by the airlines' lackadaisical attitude toward security, as well as their vehement opposition to change. Lives were lost and people lived in fear while airline executives and government officials bickered about details and finances.
Koerner has an engaging, conversational writing style that made me feel like he was sitting beside me, telling me a story. This is a nonfiction book that often reads like fiction. At times I had to remind myself that, while crazy, these things did really happen.
January 21, 2015
In the end, Brendan Koerner’s The Skies Belong to Us, is about character.
I’m not old enough to remember the plague of airline hijackings that took place in and around American airspace during the hippie era, but I do remember laughing with my mom through a television rerun of The Out of Towners, a 1970 Jack Lemmon comedy. In it, everything that can go wrong for two hapless New York tourists does, and despite the appearance of a happy ending, the two find themselves on a hijacked plane just before the credits roll. “This plane is going to Havana, Cuba!” announces the hijacker as he brandishes a gun. (Apparently a lot of these folks were aiming for Cuba; they envisioned a revolutionary paradise when, in reality, Castro jailed ‘em instead.)
Initially that’s why I picked up this book: Because I am old enough to remember the aftermath of the ’60s and ’70s skyjacking plague.
In The Skies Belong to Us, Brendan Koerner provides readers with a central romantic antihero narrative on which his exhaustive research hangs. But nothing hangs so long as to slow things down. Koerner’s approach and writing is solid as cement, yet it moves as quickly as a TV news crawler.
Readers are treated to a time when airline privileges included paying for your tickets in the air and no TSA screenings, full body scanners, metal detectors, long lines, or being spoken to as though you were asking your fellow travelers for spare change. As you seamlessly breeze in and out of the rich cultural and criminal scenery of dozens of hijackings, you are anchored by and hooked to Bonnie and Clyde at 30,000 feet. This, after all, is mainly the story of San Diego lovers Roger Holder and Cathy Marie Kerkow, who themselves pulled off one of the most infamous commercial airline hijackings of all time. Throughout their four decades-long tale, there’s loads of history pertinent to both the lovers’ fate and the timeline of airline safety, policy, and security. It’s a revealing, entertaining read.
As we accompany Holder, Kerkow, and other and less successful, looney hijackers, we see how simultaneously naïve and crafty the commercial airline industry was before, during, and after skyjackings reached 82 per year in 1969 (82!!!). We learn of the industry’s resistance to pricey metal detectors and lobbyists who dissuaded Washington from laws making it mandatory to X-ray carry-on luggage. And we gain insight into how both law-enforcement and the airline industry adapted to then weekly hijackings: at first by giving in to demands made, then by giving in to trigger-happy FBI agents. All of this is just as engrossing as Holder and Kerkow’s “happy” ending once they walk away with the ransom money.
With every turn of the page comes something else that’s difficult to imagine in today’s post-9/11 world. Then there’s Kerkow and Holder: he with his paranoia, excuses, and Vietnam trauma, and she with her culturally insensitive amoralism. One minute you catch yourself hoping they’ll get away, and the next you find yourself soothed by their misfortune. Their story is a roller coaster of principles, ideology, practical law enforcement realities, and people’s need to feel important. Ultimately, Koerner portrays the couple and every other hijacker he addresses in very human strokes. I found myself moved by the sadness of some, the idiocy of most, and the unique place in history they all occupy.
Several times throughout the book, Koerner points out that virtually all of the hijackers between 1957 in 1985 were desperate, misguided people who, at certain points in their lives, decided they needed to pull off something big and theatrical to prove to the world that they mattered.
And that’s probably the biggest reason I enjoyed Koerner’s effort. We see a lot of that thinking today, too frequently involving moving targets.
Like disgraced Vietnam vet Holder, aspiring hijackers were people who’d seen others take command of entire airports, demand ransoms, boss the police around, and grab the world’s attention. Desperate to feel like they, too, could seize the day, sweep away their regrets, and free themselves of unfavorable circumstances, the hijackers of The Skies Belong to Us thought they’d found an answer.
Redirecting an airliner’s flight path at gunpoint was seen by many as a form of heroic, personal reinvention. So really, this story is about spectacularly poor coping skills, rationalizations, excuses, and deep resentments. In terms of Roger Holder and Cathy Kerkow, it’s also about people who were disillusioned to utterly shocking degrees. In Kerkow’s case there was an astonishing a lack of self-direction and purpose, but as a fugitive (still), she may have gotten one of the juiciest last laughs law enforcement will ever know.
In sum: The Skies Belong to Us is a kick ass true crime epic written like a (good) Tarantino movie that I want to go see now-now-now!
.
I’m not old enough to remember the plague of airline hijackings that took place in and around American airspace during the hippie era, but I do remember laughing with my mom through a television rerun of The Out of Towners, a 1970 Jack Lemmon comedy. In it, everything that can go wrong for two hapless New York tourists does, and despite the appearance of a happy ending, the two find themselves on a hijacked plane just before the credits roll. “This plane is going to Havana, Cuba!” announces the hijacker as he brandishes a gun. (Apparently a lot of these folks were aiming for Cuba; they envisioned a revolutionary paradise when, in reality, Castro jailed ‘em instead.)
Initially that’s why I picked up this book: Because I am old enough to remember the aftermath of the ’60s and ’70s skyjacking plague.
In The Skies Belong to Us, Brendan Koerner provides readers with a central romantic antihero narrative on which his exhaustive research hangs. But nothing hangs so long as to slow things down. Koerner’s approach and writing is solid as cement, yet it moves as quickly as a TV news crawler.
Readers are treated to a time when airline privileges included paying for your tickets in the air and no TSA screenings, full body scanners, metal detectors, long lines, or being spoken to as though you were asking your fellow travelers for spare change. As you seamlessly breeze in and out of the rich cultural and criminal scenery of dozens of hijackings, you are anchored by and hooked to Bonnie and Clyde at 30,000 feet. This, after all, is mainly the story of San Diego lovers Roger Holder and Cathy Marie Kerkow, who themselves pulled off one of the most infamous commercial airline hijackings of all time. Throughout their four decades-long tale, there’s loads of history pertinent to both the lovers’ fate and the timeline of airline safety, policy, and security. It’s a revealing, entertaining read.
As we accompany Holder, Kerkow, and other and less successful, looney hijackers, we see how simultaneously naïve and crafty the commercial airline industry was before, during, and after skyjackings reached 82 per year in 1969 (82!!!). We learn of the industry’s resistance to pricey metal detectors and lobbyists who dissuaded Washington from laws making it mandatory to X-ray carry-on luggage. And we gain insight into how both law-enforcement and the airline industry adapted to then weekly hijackings: at first by giving in to demands made, then by giving in to trigger-happy FBI agents. All of this is just as engrossing as Holder and Kerkow’s “happy” ending once they walk away with the ransom money.
With every turn of the page comes something else that’s difficult to imagine in today’s post-9/11 world. Then there’s Kerkow and Holder: he with his paranoia, excuses, and Vietnam trauma, and she with her culturally insensitive amoralism. One minute you catch yourself hoping they’ll get away, and the next you find yourself soothed by their misfortune. Their story is a roller coaster of principles, ideology, practical law enforcement realities, and people’s need to feel important. Ultimately, Koerner portrays the couple and every other hijacker he addresses in very human strokes. I found myself moved by the sadness of some, the idiocy of most, and the unique place in history they all occupy.
Several times throughout the book, Koerner points out that virtually all of the hijackers between 1957 in 1985 were desperate, misguided people who, at certain points in their lives, decided they needed to pull off something big and theatrical to prove to the world that they mattered.
And that’s probably the biggest reason I enjoyed Koerner’s effort. We see a lot of that thinking today, too frequently involving moving targets.
Like disgraced Vietnam vet Holder, aspiring hijackers were people who’d seen others take command of entire airports, demand ransoms, boss the police around, and grab the world’s attention. Desperate to feel like they, too, could seize the day, sweep away their regrets, and free themselves of unfavorable circumstances, the hijackers of The Skies Belong to Us thought they’d found an answer.
Redirecting an airliner’s flight path at gunpoint was seen by many as a form of heroic, personal reinvention. So really, this story is about spectacularly poor coping skills, rationalizations, excuses, and deep resentments. In terms of Roger Holder and Cathy Kerkow, it’s also about people who were disillusioned to utterly shocking degrees. In Kerkow’s case there was an astonishing a lack of self-direction and purpose, but as a fugitive (still), she may have gotten one of the juiciest last laughs law enforcement will ever know.
In sum: The Skies Belong to Us is a kick ass true crime epic written like a (good) Tarantino movie that I want to go see now-now-now!
.
July 2, 2013
I was hooked by Dwight Garner's NYT review of this book and by gosh, he was right. I do think there's something slightly off about the way "The Skies Belong to Us" is structured and organized, but the material is just so jaw-dropping, starting and ending with the seemingly boundless tolerance American society once had for skyjacking, 30 years before 9/11. Two or three skyjackings during some weeks in the early '70s! No carry-on screenings! No ID checks! No boarding passes! (If the final season of "Mad Men" doesn't have a hijacking in it, then it will be a serious omission.)
It also brought back a boyhood memory. I am just barely old enough to remember the final days of old-fashioned flying. In 1977, when I was 8, I flew commercial by myself (with a fraction of the aid afforded to unaccompanied minors these days); I spent the night before the flight wide awake and worried sick that the flight would be hijacked. Of course it wasn't. The whole experience was the height of glamor for me then. The stewardesses gave me a flight bag full of puzzles and toys. They brought around a silver plate stacked high with donuts. Passengers smoked the whole way. When we landed, my father met me at the gate with a present for my achievement: a navy blue Timex watch.
But back to the book review. I wasn't all that interested in the "love story" told here, until Roger and Cathy found themselves stuck in Algiers and then in Paris. The book gets better and better as it goes along. And what a puzzling and fascinating end, almost D.B. Cooper-like! I wonder if the renewed attention will smoke out a fresh lead?
This was the last of four books I read on vacation. To my delight, I finished it in first class (upgrade!) on the flight home. It never once occurred to me that in this age of heightened paranoia, I blithely sent the book through the TSA conveyor.
It also brought back a boyhood memory. I am just barely old enough to remember the final days of old-fashioned flying. In 1977, when I was 8, I flew commercial by myself (with a fraction of the aid afforded to unaccompanied minors these days); I spent the night before the flight wide awake and worried sick that the flight would be hijacked. Of course it wasn't. The whole experience was the height of glamor for me then. The stewardesses gave me a flight bag full of puzzles and toys. They brought around a silver plate stacked high with donuts. Passengers smoked the whole way. When we landed, my father met me at the gate with a present for my achievement: a navy blue Timex watch.
But back to the book review. I wasn't all that interested in the "love story" told here, until Roger and Cathy found themselves stuck in Algiers and then in Paris. The book gets better and better as it goes along. And what a puzzling and fascinating end, almost D.B. Cooper-like! I wonder if the renewed attention will smoke out a fresh lead?
This was the last of four books I read on vacation. To my delight, I finished it in first class (upgrade!) on the flight home. It never once occurred to me that in this age of heightened paranoia, I blithely sent the book through the TSA conveyor.
September 4, 2015
I don't know about the rest of my fellow Americans, but the only hijackings I'm familiar with are the really big ones, like D.B. Cooper. I was complete unaware that hijackings were a "thing" throughout the 1960s and early 1970s. I mean, seriously a thing, like people accepted it as a normal part of air travel, that your plane might get hijacked and flown to Cuba and you might miss a day or two out of your life. It's absolutely mind boggling to think about.
Koerner does an excellent job of interweaving the history of "skyjackings," and the reasons behind them, with the story of one particular skyjacking: the one perpetrated by Roger Holder and his girlfriend Catherine Kerkow, who took their misappropriated plane to Algeria. What's particularly nice is that the author was able to interview Holder before he passed away, so many of his memories and thoughts are included in the book.
I had a little trouble getting into it at first, but once I did, I couldn't put it down. I read the last 200 pages in one day. Everything about it was genuinely mind blowing to me: that the hijackings were allowed to go on for so long without any serious attempts to stop them, that the airlines were so resistant to add security (particularly hard to believe in a post-9/11 world), how the Vietnam War was connected to the issue, and the ultimate fate of Holder and Kerkow.
This is a real page turner. Excellent book.
Koerner does an excellent job of interweaving the history of "skyjackings," and the reasons behind them, with the story of one particular skyjacking: the one perpetrated by Roger Holder and his girlfriend Catherine Kerkow, who took their misappropriated plane to Algeria. What's particularly nice is that the author was able to interview Holder before he passed away, so many of his memories and thoughts are included in the book.
I had a little trouble getting into it at first, but once I did, I couldn't put it down. I read the last 200 pages in one day. Everything about it was genuinely mind blowing to me: that the hijackings were allowed to go on for so long without any serious attempts to stop them, that the airlines were so resistant to add security (particularly hard to believe in a post-9/11 world), how the Vietnam War was connected to the issue, and the ultimate fate of Holder and Kerkow.
This is a real page turner. Excellent book.
March 9, 2019
I honestly had no idea that skyjacking was a thing in the 1960s and 1970s. I'd heard of Dan (or D. B.) Cooper, but that was literally it until this book.
The parts that kept me interested were the small snapshots of other skyjackings and how airport security measures came to be in response to them. The actual skyjacking that this book is mostly about didn't intrigue me as much, and I think it would have been better dealt with in a long essay, rather than in a book.
The author also has the tendency to describe every woman in terms of her attractiveness (or not), and he goes out of his way to talk about Cathy Kerkow's looks and "immodesty" to the point that it was distracting and ridiculous.
The parts that kept me interested were the small snapshots of other skyjackings and how airport security measures came to be in response to them. The actual skyjacking that this book is mostly about didn't intrigue me as much, and I think it would have been better dealt with in a long essay, rather than in a book.
The author also has the tendency to describe every woman in terms of her attractiveness (or not), and he goes out of his way to talk about Cathy Kerkow's looks and "immodesty" to the point that it was distracting and ridiculous.
November 18, 2015
A riveting read about the skyjacking epidemic of the late 60's and early 70's focusing on the personal stories of Roger Holder and Kathy Kerkow - the Bonnie and Clyde of the skies. The outrageous personal stories of domestic hijackers is fascinating in itself, but what's more incredible is how a study of the subject of hijacking and how it was handled by the government and the airlines highlights the stark contrast between the respect of individual civil liberties in the 1970's and the shockingly eroded state of those liberties today. What a difference fifty years makes.
August 4, 2017
should have been longer, and there's rather more omniscient narration than the sourced materials justify. with that said, lots of fun. remember, kids: it's better to collect experiences than things, but a good hijacking can be both.
March 11, 2016
Who you gonna believe, me or your own eyes?
– Chico Marx, “Duck Soup” (1933)
This is a very enjoyable audiobook with a sprawling and complex story. I'm going to write about only one facet of it.
Opposing political viewpoints champion different narratives about how the world works. This book and Foolproof by Greg Ip, which I listened to consecutively, are two recently-issued examples of conflicting narrative. The topic getting the ideological narrative makeover is, in this case, aviation safety, although neither book is exclusively about that topic. Those familiar with the American political landscape could probably make an accurate guess of each author's narrative slant based solely on the knowledge that Ip is on the staff of The Economist and Koerner's writings appeared, among other places, in Mother Jones. Who you gonna believe?
Although Ip's book is about airplane crashes and similar disasters, and this book is about hijacking, I propose that talking about the two phenomenon together as instances of air safety is NOT like comparing apples and oranges.
It is an inarguable fact that air travel is one of the safest activities a person can engage in. Certainly it's safer than driving yourself. The question is: How did it get that way?
Ip argues, if I understand correctly, the rise of airline travel for the masses occurred at the same moment that prolonged prosperity translated into a hunger for eliminating risk as much as possible from life. Since they recognized the needs of their customers, airlines did not need to be coaxed by government regulation as airlines recognized that safe skies were profitable skies – in the long run. They invested in expensive equipment and private security contracts because they understood it as a good investment.
Koerner, on the other hand, documents years of obstructionism, specious arguments, and regulatory capture as airlines took a prolonged rear-guard action against getting into the air safety business out of pure unalloyed shortsightedness. From '60s to the '90s, hundreds of people's lives were unnecessarily put in danger. Only by dumb luck or divine protection (as you prefer) were a mere handful of people actually killed by this sad-sack collection of sky pirates. Still, those were avoidable deaths.
Take these both together and you have, in my sight, evidence that the large profit-making entities will always do the right thing once all other alternatives have been exhausted (BTW, this turn of phrase has been attributed to Winston Churchill incorrectly). The trick is to exhaust all the possibilities as quickly as possible – “fail faster”, as the youngsters are saying nowadays. To do that, a good healthy segment of the population must act as if they have a near-pathological suspicion of all money-making enterprises and a burning desire to act on their near-pathology. The easiest way to compel yourself to act on this belief is to actually believe in it. To put it another way: in order to experience the benevolent effects of free markets, it is necessary for many people to act as if they don't exist.
– Chico Marx, “Duck Soup” (1933)
This is a very enjoyable audiobook with a sprawling and complex story. I'm going to write about only one facet of it.
Opposing political viewpoints champion different narratives about how the world works. This book and Foolproof by Greg Ip, which I listened to consecutively, are two recently-issued examples of conflicting narrative. The topic getting the ideological narrative makeover is, in this case, aviation safety, although neither book is exclusively about that topic. Those familiar with the American political landscape could probably make an accurate guess of each author's narrative slant based solely on the knowledge that Ip is on the staff of The Economist and Koerner's writings appeared, among other places, in Mother Jones. Who you gonna believe?
Although Ip's book is about airplane crashes and similar disasters, and this book is about hijacking, I propose that talking about the two phenomenon together as instances of air safety is NOT like comparing apples and oranges.
It is an inarguable fact that air travel is one of the safest activities a person can engage in. Certainly it's safer than driving yourself. The question is: How did it get that way?
Ip argues, if I understand correctly, the rise of airline travel for the masses occurred at the same moment that prolonged prosperity translated into a hunger for eliminating risk as much as possible from life. Since they recognized the needs of their customers, airlines did not need to be coaxed by government regulation as airlines recognized that safe skies were profitable skies – in the long run. They invested in expensive equipment and private security contracts because they understood it as a good investment.
Koerner, on the other hand, documents years of obstructionism, specious arguments, and regulatory capture as airlines took a prolonged rear-guard action against getting into the air safety business out of pure unalloyed shortsightedness. From '60s to the '90s, hundreds of people's lives were unnecessarily put in danger. Only by dumb luck or divine protection (as you prefer) were a mere handful of people actually killed by this sad-sack collection of sky pirates. Still, those were avoidable deaths.
Take these both together and you have, in my sight, evidence that the large profit-making entities will always do the right thing once all other alternatives have been exhausted (BTW, this turn of phrase has been attributed to Winston Churchill incorrectly). The trick is to exhaust all the possibilities as quickly as possible – “fail faster”, as the youngsters are saying nowadays. To do that, a good healthy segment of the population must act as if they have a near-pathological suspicion of all money-making enterprises and a burning desire to act on their near-pathology. The easiest way to compel yourself to act on this belief is to actually believe in it. To put it another way: in order to experience the benevolent effects of free markets, it is necessary for many people to act as if they don't exist.
July 6, 2013
So great, this book, for so many reasons. In The Skies Belong to Us journalist Brendan I Koerner takes us back to the "golden age of hijacking", a period of about five years in the late '60s, early '70s when, astonishingly, on average a commercial airplane was skyjacked (in the preferred tabloid parlance) in American air space once every WEEK. And the airlines refused to institute any sort of security measures at the airport during most of this time! Because 1. it'd be enormously expensive and they didn't want to give up their soaring profits and 2. they were afraid customers wouldn't stand for it, both because they'd have to wait on a "15 minute" line AND because going through their customers' bags or even forcing people to pass through metal detectors would be too great an invasion of privacy. And so someone would get on a plane every week with a gun or a bomb (or a fake gun or fake bomb) and, early on, take everyone to Cuba where they would beg an increasingly uninterested Castro for political asylum or, after a few years, simply demand a huge ransom and a parachute. That whole story, of the many different types of skyjackers, and their strategies and motivations, and how the country (politicians, airlines, passengers, press) reacted to the all of this is, I think, just endlessly fascinating, especially in the hands of as good a writer as Koerner, who fills every page with amazing little facts without missing the big picture.
But the majority of this admirably brisk book isn't even about all of that; isn't really a general history of hijacking. Rather, Koerner focusses mainly here on Roger Holder and Cathy Kerkow, a early-20s couple, completely dysfunctional in so many ways, who separately and together have one of the most unlikely backstories you'll ever hear, and who somehow managed to pull off the most successful hijacking in history up until that point (in terms of amount of ransom received and distance traveled without getting caught), AND become folk heroes of the international left while doing it. I'm not going to give you any details, because I didn't know (or didn't remember) anything about their story, and it really is quite amazing, the trajectory of their lives. Koerner is a fantastic reporter, he tells the Holder and Kerkow's tale in a we-are-there novelistic fashion, interspersed with well-researched chapters on the skyjacking epidemic as a whole. Just great, all of it.
But the majority of this admirably brisk book isn't even about all of that; isn't really a general history of hijacking. Rather, Koerner focusses mainly here on Roger Holder and Cathy Kerkow, a early-20s couple, completely dysfunctional in so many ways, who separately and together have one of the most unlikely backstories you'll ever hear, and who somehow managed to pull off the most successful hijacking in history up until that point (in terms of amount of ransom received and distance traveled without getting caught), AND become folk heroes of the international left while doing it. I'm not going to give you any details, because I didn't know (or didn't remember) anything about their story, and it really is quite amazing, the trajectory of their lives. Koerner is a fantastic reporter, he tells the Holder and Kerkow's tale in a we-are-there novelistic fashion, interspersed with well-researched chapters on the skyjacking epidemic as a whole. Just great, all of it.
July 13, 2013
The Skies Belong to Us by Brendan I. Koerner is time trip back to when hijacking was so common that people were not surprised when they heard about yet another one. This period was between 1961 and 1972. I wanted to read this book because I had friend whose plane from Beirut, Lebanon was hijacked. He wrote me of the nervous hours waiting to find out if he was going to live or die.
Brendan I. Koerner limited his review of hijacking to only the ones that started in the U.S. and centered on one that I remember. That involved William Roger Holder, a nerdy boy when he was young who suffered discrimination for being black and was an outsider to the blacks that he met. He didn’t fit in. He was tall and lanky and lacked a sense of good judgment. His partner was Cathy Kerkow. She picked the wrong friends and seemed to live only in the moment. She was sort of a hippie girl when he met her, pot smoking and small time dealing, sexually promiscuous and deeply affected by her parent’s marriage breaking up.
Brendan I.Koerner picked a great subject to write about. This book pulls you in and won’t let you go! I recommend starting it when you have a good chuck of time to read. The hijacking history is like Ripley’s Believe or Not”. The stories are true but so amazing. I don’t remember a single hijacking that was boring. It also was not all about the money, there were so many different motivations.
Long ago, we used to be able to walk to the gate and meet our friends and family right after they walked through the chute from the plane. There were no metal detectors, no rules about bring liquids to the area, no body scans and people even brought their kids to see the places take off and land. The true stories of the hijackers make you wonder why security measures took so long but the author clues you in with the political struggles that prevented that change.
This is a wonderful book to read if you lived in that “once upon a time era” before hijacking or if you are too young for that you want an understanding of the strange age of hijacking. This is one of the few books that ask you to please read it!
I highly recommend this book to all who history, politics or great writing. You will not be disappointed.
I received this book from the Amazon Vine program and that in no way influenced my review.
Brendan I. Koerner limited his review of hijacking to only the ones that started in the U.S. and centered on one that I remember. That involved William Roger Holder, a nerdy boy when he was young who suffered discrimination for being black and was an outsider to the blacks that he met. He didn’t fit in. He was tall and lanky and lacked a sense of good judgment. His partner was Cathy Kerkow. She picked the wrong friends and seemed to live only in the moment. She was sort of a hippie girl when he met her, pot smoking and small time dealing, sexually promiscuous and deeply affected by her parent’s marriage breaking up.
Brendan I.Koerner picked a great subject to write about. This book pulls you in and won’t let you go! I recommend starting it when you have a good chuck of time to read. The hijacking history is like Ripley’s Believe or Not”. The stories are true but so amazing. I don’t remember a single hijacking that was boring. It also was not all about the money, there were so many different motivations.
Long ago, we used to be able to walk to the gate and meet our friends and family right after they walked through the chute from the plane. There were no metal detectors, no rules about bring liquids to the area, no body scans and people even brought their kids to see the places take off and land. The true stories of the hijackers make you wonder why security measures took so long but the author clues you in with the political struggles that prevented that change.
This is a wonderful book to read if you lived in that “once upon a time era” before hijacking or if you are too young for that you want an understanding of the strange age of hijacking. This is one of the few books that ask you to please read it!
I highly recommend this book to all who history, politics or great writing. You will not be disappointed.
I received this book from the Amazon Vine program and that in no way influenced my review.
August 13, 2013
I don't read much non-fiction. When I do, it's often for research. Every once in a while I pick up a non-fiction book that looks interesting to me and give it a read. And more often than not I find myself engrossed in the story. Probably I should see this as a sign that I need to read more of these stories. Enter The Skies Belong to Us.
The cover, the promise of love and hijacking, these are the things that first attracted me to The Skies Belong to Us. More than any other type of narrative non-fiction, my favorite are those stories told about events or people I knew nothing about. And really, who knows about Roger Holder and Cathy Kerkow? Who remembers the eruption of skyjacking in the sixties and seventies? It was a time when a plane was hijacked every week, when airport security was non-existent, a time when you could actually commandeer a plane, fly halfway across the world, and find asylum in a far away land. That's exactly what Holder and Kerkow did.
Koerner's book is half Holder's and Kerkow's story, half an exploration of the history of skyjacking. He balances the two extremely well. And it is abundantly clear Koerner has done his research. I found myself wanting to know more, especially about some of the other hijackings Koerner mentioned; more than once I had to stop reading to perform an Internet search.
The only misstep Koerner takes in this book, in my opinion, is that he provides too much insight into the subjects' point-of-view. Yes, Koerner conducted significant research and did several interviews, and he may have had an idea what these individuals were thinking and seeing, but in a work of non-fiction it comes off as reaching too hard. Some of it seemed too speculative. Aside from this, my only other complaint was that the second half of the book lagged under the weight of court cases and bureaucracy, but that is somewhat to be expected in a book such as this one. Besides, when you have such a phenomenal, high-paced start, you can't expect the whole book to maintain that level of suspense.
The Skies Belong to Us is so well researched and presented that it left me with only one question, one Koerner himself presents in the final pages. That is, where is Cathy Kerkow?
The cover, the promise of love and hijacking, these are the things that first attracted me to The Skies Belong to Us. More than any other type of narrative non-fiction, my favorite are those stories told about events or people I knew nothing about. And really, who knows about Roger Holder and Cathy Kerkow? Who remembers the eruption of skyjacking in the sixties and seventies? It was a time when a plane was hijacked every week, when airport security was non-existent, a time when you could actually commandeer a plane, fly halfway across the world, and find asylum in a far away land. That's exactly what Holder and Kerkow did.
Koerner's book is half Holder's and Kerkow's story, half an exploration of the history of skyjacking. He balances the two extremely well. And it is abundantly clear Koerner has done his research. I found myself wanting to know more, especially about some of the other hijackings Koerner mentioned; more than once I had to stop reading to perform an Internet search.
The only misstep Koerner takes in this book, in my opinion, is that he provides too much insight into the subjects' point-of-view. Yes, Koerner conducted significant research and did several interviews, and he may have had an idea what these individuals were thinking and seeing, but in a work of non-fiction it comes off as reaching too hard. Some of it seemed too speculative. Aside from this, my only other complaint was that the second half of the book lagged under the weight of court cases and bureaucracy, but that is somewhat to be expected in a book such as this one. Besides, when you have such a phenomenal, high-paced start, you can't expect the whole book to maintain that level of suspense.
The Skies Belong to Us is so well researched and presented that it left me with only one question, one Koerner himself presents in the final pages. That is, where is Cathy Kerkow?
September 12, 2013
From 1968-1973, hijacking, once a largely anomalous and relatively peaceful act, grew into an epidemic of such proportions that weekly hijackings became the norm. In The Skies Belong to Us, Brendan I. Koerner traces the history of skyjacking from an act of rebellion rooted in the mystique of Cuba into a wildly successful and life-threatening act of piracy that was seemingly unstoppable due to the airlines collective intractability over the necessity of airport security screening procedures.
Koerner’s insightful historical and cultural analysis feels fresh and current, avoiding the fusty “those were the good old days” miasma that so many works about or set in the 1960s/early 1970s seem to be mired in. The historical figures who appear in the book (Angela Davis, Eldridge Cleaver, and Fidel Castro to name a few) come to life as real people, not just symbols of the revolution. Koerner writes history like it’s a thriller, and even knowing that the hijackings of this time period never hit 9/11 proportions doesn’t spoil anything at all in terms of suspense and sheer narrative pleasure.
Koerner focuses on a pair of hijackers: Roger Holder, a bookish black man with paranoid tendencies who’d gone AWOL after too many tours in Vietnam, and Cathy Kerkow, a blonde, exuberant, feisty girl of 21 whose hijacking suitcase consisted of a bikini and sandals and not much else. She must not have completely understood Holder’s plan, to use the plane to “rescue” Angela Davis, an high profile black intellectual on trial for kidnapping, and deliver the avowed Communist (and enemy of California governor Ronald Reagan) to Hanoi where they would all be welcomed with open arms as heroes in the struggle. He traces their lives from their first meeting as children and their later chance reunion that both deemed fate. We see that they are products of their time, but Koerner doesn’t leave them stuck in history as symbols or archetypes. As people, their personal struggles made them sympathetic without undermining the sheer audacity of the criminal act they perpetrated. I’m haunted by the ending, where we find out where Holder and Kerkow are (or aren’t) now, and we see how far the world has moved on.
Koerner’s insightful historical and cultural analysis feels fresh and current, avoiding the fusty “those were the good old days” miasma that so many works about or set in the 1960s/early 1970s seem to be mired in. The historical figures who appear in the book (Angela Davis, Eldridge Cleaver, and Fidel Castro to name a few) come to life as real people, not just symbols of the revolution. Koerner writes history like it’s a thriller, and even knowing that the hijackings of this time period never hit 9/11 proportions doesn’t spoil anything at all in terms of suspense and sheer narrative pleasure.
Koerner focuses on a pair of hijackers: Roger Holder, a bookish black man with paranoid tendencies who’d gone AWOL after too many tours in Vietnam, and Cathy Kerkow, a blonde, exuberant, feisty girl of 21 whose hijacking suitcase consisted of a bikini and sandals and not much else. She must not have completely understood Holder’s plan, to use the plane to “rescue” Angela Davis, an high profile black intellectual on trial for kidnapping, and deliver the avowed Communist (and enemy of California governor Ronald Reagan) to Hanoi where they would all be welcomed with open arms as heroes in the struggle. He traces their lives from their first meeting as children and their later chance reunion that both deemed fate. We see that they are products of their time, but Koerner doesn’t leave them stuck in history as symbols or archetypes. As people, their personal struggles made them sympathetic without undermining the sheer audacity of the criminal act they perpetrated. I’m haunted by the ending, where we find out where Holder and Kerkow are (or aren’t) now, and we see how far the world has moved on.
September 6, 2015
It's only February and yet I think I found my first favorite book of the year. I'm just glad I didn't have to wait so long this time around! This book was an eye-opening look at air travel in what was purported to be coined "the Golden Age of Hijacking." Keep in mind I had thought (before reading this) that the rash of commandeering aircraft started in the 1980's with such terrorists as the Libyans (I'm old enough to actually remember that). Needless to say, I couldn't have been more wrong!
Before the era of the now-familiar TSA, people actually never had to go through a type of stringent security as we have now. You could meet people at their gate as they disembarked (yet another thing that i vividly can remember). This isn't to say that all the changes that we take for granted now, didn't just happen overnight. They were implemented at a somewhat glacial pace. I found it somewhat amusing that the Nixon administration was trying anything they could while at the same time the burgeoning Watergate scandal was starting to envelop them. Most of the original ideas for air security were so simplified and basic that it's hard to even think of them now.
The story itself centers itself upon two individuals: a black man and a white woman who attempt to pull off the greatest sky-jacking in history. The actual event is too detailed to try to describe here, you just need to read this amazing story for yourself and try to keep reminding yourself that yes, it really DID happen. Enjoy this story. I can guarantee you that you'll never look at air travel in quite possibly the same way again.
ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED IN 2013.
Before the era of the now-familiar TSA, people actually never had to go through a type of stringent security as we have now. You could meet people at their gate as they disembarked (yet another thing that i vividly can remember). This isn't to say that all the changes that we take for granted now, didn't just happen overnight. They were implemented at a somewhat glacial pace. I found it somewhat amusing that the Nixon administration was trying anything they could while at the same time the burgeoning Watergate scandal was starting to envelop them. Most of the original ideas for air security were so simplified and basic that it's hard to even think of them now.
The story itself centers itself upon two individuals: a black man and a white woman who attempt to pull off the greatest sky-jacking in history. The actual event is too detailed to try to describe here, you just need to read this amazing story for yourself and try to keep reminding yourself that yes, it really DID happen. Enjoy this story. I can guarantee you that you'll never look at air travel in quite possibly the same way again.
ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED IN 2013.
September 15, 2014
This is masterful, fascinating nonfiction. My favorite nonfiction has the ability to pique my extreme interest in topics that could, in theory, be covered in a few Wikipedia paragraphs. Here, though, is book-length coverage of a topic—with all the dates, historical facts, cultural background and other necessities that nonfiction requires—all expertly woven into a plot that feels almost like fiction. Koerner covers the Golden Age of Hijacking (a 5-year period starting in 1968) in which an American jetliner was “skyjacked” nearly once a week. He focuses on one particular hijacking: the taking of Western Airlines Flight 701 by Vietnam veteran Roger Holder and small-time weed dealer Cathy Kerkow. Their story melds the book together, their hijacking a perfect example of how the unrest of the era manifested in hijackings designed to make a political statement, elicit cash ransoms, or both. Given today’s TSA-laden airports, the snippets of the book about the commercial air lobby balking at security checkpoints because they feared travelers would take to the roads to avoid the inconvenience are written appropriately tongue-in-cheek. (“They’ll never submit to having their personal effects X-rayed!”) I wanted to call this one of the most interesting nonfiction books I’ve read this year, but I decided it’s just one of the most interesting I’ve read this year period. Highly recommend it.
August 13, 2016
A book i probably never would have picked up, and absolutely loved. Although i was old enough to remember, and often flew, i don't have any clear memory of the spate, epidemic really, of skyjackings that happened in the 60s and 70s before we had to submit to body searches to fly anywhere. This is an almost unbelievable tale of two very young people who almost accidentally fall into one of the most amazing stories of those decades. Included are elements of the Vietnam travesty, institutional and individual racism, the sexual revolution, the Black Panthers, Lynne Stewart, French existentialists and so much more. Woven through are many stories of the crazed, and totally sane, people who skyjacked planes and their outcomes, but the main focus is on two of the most improbable.
A wild, well documented and researched, romp, and a great read.
This was a GOODREADS Give-Away book. So lucky!!
A wild, well documented and researched, romp, and a great read.
This was a GOODREADS Give-Away book. So lucky!!
August 8, 2016
Fascinating and completely bonkers. This is the story of the longest-distance hijacking in American history, accomplished by a disillusioned veteran and a teenage girl. The author weaves in accounts of other hijackings during that time period. I had no idea that hijackings (particularly to Cuba) were happening an average of once per week in the late 1960s and early 1970s, and sometimes there were two U.S.-based hijackings in a day. A lot of people back then thought that it was just the cost of doing business and that security measures would never work. Weirdly, this makes me hopeful that some of the seemingly impossible problems that we face today are at least partly solvable.
January 9, 2014
This book is a sleeper hit. FANTASTIC book. As a child of the 80s I had NO idea that so much aviation hijacking happened through the 60s and 70s!
The author is brilliant in his unfolding of this crazy time period and his focusing on Roger Holder and his girlfriends successful hijacking in 1973. I would recommend this book to anyone who is looking to understand these decades better, the political landscape of the time and this immensely entertaining retelling of so much CRAZY drama:)
The author is brilliant in his unfolding of this crazy time period and his focusing on Roger Holder and his girlfriends successful hijacking in 1973. I would recommend this book to anyone who is looking to understand these decades better, the political landscape of the time and this immensely entertaining retelling of so much CRAZY drama:)
August 10, 2014
Incredible – Koerner tells this story in a way that is breathtakingly engrossing, and while the narrative parallels a mass-market best seller in its page-turning pace, the literary quality is anything but. The prose is beautifully crafted, and every fact is thoroughly researched, as belied by the extensive set of footnotes. If you have even a passing interest in aviation, you must read this book.
December 14, 2015
I tend to avoid nonfiction, but this will now go down as one of my favorites. A really strong, fascinating book about the "golden age of hijacking" that focuses on one couple and their bizarre plan. I raced through it, more exciting and interesting than most fiction I read. Strong, compelling writing and a great subject.
January 14, 2019
Wish I could go 4.5 (some overwriting) but really a ripping narrative. Listen to The Blotter Presents 081 for more!
May 7, 2023
I love books like this, the kind which take up a meaty subject and give you so much in depth detail and background, that you feel like you knew absolutely nothing about it before. Koerner’s excellent research uncovers all kinds of weird and wacky cases of skyjacking. Thankfully rarely did these events lead to fatalities, but through this fun and intrepid account, we find all sorts of bizarre and compelling permutations and outcomes.
Thanks to continuous and extensive lobbying by greedy corporate airlines, and an all too obliging government, this helped to create a culture which allowed skyjacking to flourish with relative ease throughout the US for many years. After enduring years of the threat and the ordeal, the airlines were eventually forced to implement some meaningful safety deterrents after one hijacker threatened to fly into a nuclear plant.
From the first hijacked commercial flight in the US in 1961 to the peak of activity in 1972 a total of 159 flights were hijacked over American skies, though it was in the last five years when the mischievous activity amped up, culminating in the 40 cases in 1972. It got so bad that not only were you getting two hijacks taking place on different planes on the same day, but there were even cases where two different interests were trying to hijack the same plane.
I had no idea that Algiers in Algeria became a magnet for the air pirates, largely due to the presence of the Black Panthers and other anti-American/Vietnam war people and groups. But by far the golden destination was Havana and Cuba, the funny thing is that most of them ended up living in cramped, grim conditions along with other US hijackers and those were the lucky ones, others who were deemed more problematic were consigned to glorified tropical gulags forced into slaving in the sugar cane plantations, resulting in torture and in some cases even suicide.
There was a bit of a skyjacking renaissance going on the early 80s, with 13 being hijacked in 1980 and another 12 taken in 1983, all heading to Havana, but nearly all were Cuban nationals wishing to return to their native land, after their American dream had soured. We see that after 1991, the crime disappeared entirely from US skies, for 9 consecutive years, with not a single commercial flight being seized. During that spell airlines grew greedy, lazy and complacent, with a decrease in staff, drops in wages and hijacking policies hadn’t change since the 60s, making ripe conditions for 9/11.
Perhaps my favourite story is the delightfully bizarre case of the eccentric Italian, Raffaele Minichiello, after being exploited in the Vietnam war, and other issues, he pulled off the astonishing feat of hijacking a plane on US airspace and still managed to get the American airline to take him all the way out to Rome in Italy. Not only did he avoid extradition and serious jail time in Italy, but he was also hailed as a national hero.
And of course it reminds us that we should never under estimate the greed, lies and awfulness of politicians, lobbyists and corporations, whose self-interest made so much of it all possible in the first place.
Thanks to continuous and extensive lobbying by greedy corporate airlines, and an all too obliging government, this helped to create a culture which allowed skyjacking to flourish with relative ease throughout the US for many years. After enduring years of the threat and the ordeal, the airlines were eventually forced to implement some meaningful safety deterrents after one hijacker threatened to fly into a nuclear plant.
From the first hijacked commercial flight in the US in 1961 to the peak of activity in 1972 a total of 159 flights were hijacked over American skies, though it was in the last five years when the mischievous activity amped up, culminating in the 40 cases in 1972. It got so bad that not only were you getting two hijacks taking place on different planes on the same day, but there were even cases where two different interests were trying to hijack the same plane.
I had no idea that Algiers in Algeria became a magnet for the air pirates, largely due to the presence of the Black Panthers and other anti-American/Vietnam war people and groups. But by far the golden destination was Havana and Cuba, the funny thing is that most of them ended up living in cramped, grim conditions along with other US hijackers and those were the lucky ones, others who were deemed more problematic were consigned to glorified tropical gulags forced into slaving in the sugar cane plantations, resulting in torture and in some cases even suicide.
There was a bit of a skyjacking renaissance going on the early 80s, with 13 being hijacked in 1980 and another 12 taken in 1983, all heading to Havana, but nearly all were Cuban nationals wishing to return to their native land, after their American dream had soured. We see that after 1991, the crime disappeared entirely from US skies, for 9 consecutive years, with not a single commercial flight being seized. During that spell airlines grew greedy, lazy and complacent, with a decrease in staff, drops in wages and hijacking policies hadn’t change since the 60s, making ripe conditions for 9/11.
Perhaps my favourite story is the delightfully bizarre case of the eccentric Italian, Raffaele Minichiello, after being exploited in the Vietnam war, and other issues, he pulled off the astonishing feat of hijacking a plane on US airspace and still managed to get the American airline to take him all the way out to Rome in Italy. Not only did he avoid extradition and serious jail time in Italy, but he was also hailed as a national hero.
And of course it reminds us that we should never under estimate the greed, lies and awfulness of politicians, lobbyists and corporations, whose self-interest made so much of it all possible in the first place.
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