George M. Skurla, the former president and chairman of Grumman Aerospace, and William H. Gregory, the former editor in chief of a leading aviation and space magazine, provide an inside view of the triumphs and disappointments of American’s onetime top aerospace contractor. They first trace the company’s rose from its humble beginnings in the 1930s through the war years to later successes with the Navy’s A-6 Intruder attack aircraft, F-14 Tomcat fighter aircraft, and the Apollo lunar module. They also explain how the business failed to keep itself together and by the 1990s had no choice but to be taken over by one of its biggest competitors. Part history, part memoir, this book describes the rise and fall the eyes of Skurla, who began his career as an apprentice engineer on the production line at Grumman in 1944 and retired in 1986 at the head of the Grumman Corporation.