The Golden Anniversary of freefall parachuting will be April 28 of this year, a hallmark in aviation’s short and often turbulent history. Fifty years ago one man became the harbinger of today’s advanced and sophisticated “skydiving” techniques, one jump changed the role of the parachute and those who were to use them. That momentous day was April 28, 1919 and the man was Leslie L. Irvin, truly one of aviation’s great figures.

Leslie L. Irvin goes over the side of a DeHavilland bomber for the first successful free fall parachute jump in this drawing by J. Scott Hamilton.  (See story of page 7.)

Ralph Minnarich shot this sunset silhouette with a 16 mm gun camera (over Elsinore, California) and blew it up through an internegative process. The jumper is Jeep Gehrighty.

Doug Goff of the USMA shot this striking composition of silhouettes during the NCPL Meet at Zephyrhills, Florida.

Steve Duell leads out a load of Wisconsin's "Sky Knights" SPC in this unique chase-plane shot by Heinz Kultmeier of the Milwaukee Sentinel.

Francis Rogallo, who had the original idea of using the “ wing” as a device to not only lower an object safely to earth but to allow man the ability to “ fly” longer between deployment and ground impact, has been working with this pro­ject since 1945. 

The Star Crest Emblem (eight-man star patch) stems from an idea that came to mind last year for the promotion of rela­tive work on a more refined scale and to commemorate the efforts of the late Bob Buquor who played a major role in the origin of star formation relative work.

Henry Gonzales, a member of the Latin Skydivers, displays lots of Christmas color in this month's cover photo by Allen Silver.

Shooting from a chase plane, Stan Kreiser catches members of the Air Force Academy Parachute Team jumping an Air Commando C-123K over Colorado.

Members of the U.S. Parachute Team hit the target at Bad Kreuznach, Germany, during practice en route to the World Meet.  Photo by Chip Maury

Sam Alexander captures a moment of flashing sun, refreshing sky, and the comradeship of accomplishment high above the Taft, California, DZ.

Navy photographer Dale Hyder, who was stationed in Hawaii in June of 1968, captured this colorful composition of canopies at the Kanuia DZ where he frequently jumped. Hyder obviously had a passion for photography but was also an active skydiver who qualified to compete in the 1968 Nationals. 

Tony Bardell of the Seattle Sky Divers, flying alongside in Jack Ady's PT-22, shot this sequence of some of the Seattle bunch nonchalantly departing a Howard on floats.