Discussing his book top gun an american story, Aerial Combat and how his book inspired the 1986 movie to the gun. Good evening. Im Lauren Rosenberg with smithsonian associates. Welcome to tonights program. To our members, im so glad youre here. Its your support that makes events like this possible. And if youre joining us for the first time, an equally warm welcome and open invitation to explore the wide range of programs we offer at smithsonian associates. Now is the perfect time to turn off your cell phone or anything else that might make noise during the program. Thank you for doing that. This past march marked the 50th anniversary of the u. S. Navy Fighter Weapons program. We are thrilled this evening to welcome the programs founder, dan pederson. He entered the u. S. Navy in 1953 and went on to become the senior officer in the group of nine men who formed the navys legendary Top Gun Program at naval station miramar in march 1969. He served in combat during the vietnam war with the
Smithsonian associates. Now is the perfect time to turn off your cell phone or anything else that might make noise during the program. Thank you for doing that. This past march marked the 50th anniversary of the u. S. Navy Fighter Weapons program. We are thrilled to welcome the programs founder, dan pedersen. He entered the u. S. Navy in 1953 and went on to become the senior officer in the group of nine men who formed the navys legendary Top Gun Program at miramar in march 1969. He served in combat during the vietnam war with the flying crews on uss hancock and three on uss enterprise. He retired as a captain having accumulated 6,100 flight hours and 105 carrier landings while flying 39 types of aircraft. For those of how know pedersens story from the 1986 movie top gun youll be happy to know that jerry brook heimer is producing top gun maverick a sequel scheduled to be released in 2020. Pedersens book top gun is available for purchase and signing following this conversation. And here
We are thrilled this evening to welcome the programs founder, dan pedderson. He went on to become the senior officer in the group of nine men who formed the navys legendary Top Gun Program at navy air station in march 1969. He served in combat during the vietnam war with the flying crews. He retired as a captain having accumulated 6,100 flight hours and 1,005 carrier landings. For those of you who know his story from the 1986 movie top gun, you will be happy to know that he is producing a sequel which is scheduled to be released in 2020. Peddersons book is available for purchase and signing following this conversation. And here to keep the conversation moving is larry burke, cure ator of u. S. Naval aviation at the national air and space museum. So now please welcome dan pedderson and larry burke. You ready to go . Im going to take about ten minutes to just set the stage here for larry and i to go back and forth in final preparation for the questions coming from you. The assumption is