On the morning of August 15, 1945, Captain Jerry Yellin flew the last combat mission of World War II out of Iwo Jima. Today, Captain Yellin is a sharp, engaging, ninety-three-year-old veteran whose story is brought to life by bestselling author Don Brown (Treason).
From April to August of 1945, Captain Jerry Yellin and a small group of fellow fighter pilots flew dangerous bombing and strafing missions out of Iwo Jima over Japan. Even days after America dropped the atomic bombs—on Hiroshima on August 6 and Nagasaki on August 9—the pilots continued to fly. Though Japan had suffered unimaginable devastation, the emperor still refused to surrender.
Bestselling author Don Brown sits down with Yellin to tell the incredible true story of the final combat mission of World War II. Nine days after Hiroshima, on the morning of August 15, Yellin and his wingman First Lieutenant Philip Schlamberg took off from Iwo Jima to bomb Tokyo. By the time Yellin returned to Iwo Jima, the war was officially over—but his young friend Schlamberg would never get to hear the news. The Last Fighter Pilot is a harrowing first-person account of war from one of America’s last living World War II veterans.
Don Brown, a former US Navy JAG officer and special assistant US attorney, is the author of thirteen legal and military books. His work includes the bestselling novels Treason (2005) and The Malacca Conspiracy (2010), as well as the exposé Call Sign Extortion 17: The Shoot-Down of SEAL Team Six (2015), a highly detailed account of the most deadly American loss-of-life in the Afghan War—the shootdown of a US Army Chinook helicopter carrying thirty Americans, including seventeen members of the vaunted SEAL Team Six.
Captain (Retired) Jerry Yellin (1924–2017) was an Army Air Corps veteran who served in WWII between 1941 and 1945.
Robertson Dean has recorded hundreds of audiobooks in most every genre. He's been nominated for several Audie Awards, won eight Earphones Awards, and was named one of AudioFile magazine's Best Voices of 2010. He lives in Los Angeles, where he records books and acts in film, TV, and (especially) on stage.