Today the name Boeing is virtually synonymous with air transport: ever since the Boeing 707 ntroduced the era of true jet travel, the company has dominated the air transport market with a seemingly endless series of clever designs covering all aspects of scheduled airline operations. And such is the strength of the company's airline hold that it expects to corner up to three-quarters of the market for new airliners up to the end of the present century.
But Boeing is a multi-faceted company, and from the same stable have come the classic B-52 Stratofortress heavy bomber, mainstay for the US Air Force's Strategic Air Command, the no less pioneering B-47 Stratojet jet-powered medium bomber, and those two Second World War stalwarts the B-17 Flying Fortress and B-29 Stratofortress that devastated Germany and Japan respectively.
Before this Boeing had concentrated on other types, the period from the middle of the First World
War to the late 1930s being marked by a large number of designs (some successful, some moder-
ately so, and some frankly unsuccessful) in the wide-ranging field of contemporary aviation - fighters, transports, trainers, medium bombers and flyingboats of various types.
This then is the story of a unique company: not only has it a history nearly as long as aviation itself, but also one that has been marked by enterprising risk-taking and a steady rise to a position almost of world dominance in its field. It is the story of a company that has truly made history and one which will continue to do so.