Without each other they were helpless, together the Three Mosquitoes were the greatest destructive force in the air. When Kirby is accidentally blinded, Travis and Shorty fly him to meet the man who is the Allies’ greatest enemy—and in whose hands lay not only the fate of the German army, but also of Kirby’s eyes.
In December 1937 Arch Whitehouse introduced a new character to the readers of Flying Aces. His name was Tug Hardwick. Tug was a fighter ace and test pilot for the US Air Service until a plane he had certified crashed and killed his brother. He gave up flying and became a correspondent for the Amalgamated News Service. His first assignment was in war torn Shanghai. It was there that he met portly “Beansie” Bishop, who also worked in China for Amalgamated. The two of them became fast friends and stuck together through all kinds of spine tingling adventures, starting with “Shanghai Snare”:
Just why had he got mixed up in that maddening war-correspondent game in bloody, shell-racked Shanghai? Tug Hardwick pondered over that question. But before he had time to answer it, Fate sent that hardy young newsman to cover an amazing story which wasn’t listed in his assignment book. The stage was set for that story when Tug dropped into the Astor House—and the bang-up action began when a bomb dropped in after him.
