Billy D. Higgins is a historian/author who writes documented histories in a highly readable style about people and events with which he has had first-hand experiences. In his latest book, Navigating the C-124 Globemaster: In the Cockpit of America’s Fist Strategic Heavy-Lift Aircraft, Higgins documents the role played by this giant, piston-powered airlifter in support of the “American Century.” He draws upon his own experience as a trans-oceanic navigator who was trained to use celestial fixes to plot the course of the piston-engine, low speed, low altitude airplane that has been referred to as the backbone of the Military Air Transport Service (MATS) from 1949 through 1974.
His first book, A Stranger and A Sojourner: Peter Caulder, free black frontiersman in antebellum Arkansas published by the University of Arkansas Press is a narrative history backed by extensive research, teaching knowledge of pre-Civil War African-American History, and nineteen years life experience operating a small yeoman farm in the Arkansas Ozarks. His book was the 2004 co-winner of the Arkansas Historical Association’s Ragsdale Award for the best Arkansas history in that year. This book, now in paperback, can be ordered directly from the site or from the University of Arkansas Press. Higgins’s baseball biography , The Barling Darling: Hal Smith in American Baseball published by the Butler Center for Arkansas Studies. The book is based on the author’s personal knowledge of Smith’s early life and his career in professional baseball and depends on nine interviews with Smith, his wife Carolyn, input from Smith’s Cardinal teammates, daughters and son, Sporting News articles, and statistical data from the Society of American Baseball Research (SABR). Smith’s MLB career included being named to two National League All Star teams, hitting a game deciding grand slam off Sandy Koufax, and catching Bob Gibson’s first Major League Baseball victory, a 1-0, nine inning game over the Milwaukee Braves that featured Henry Aaron and Eddie Matthews. Hal’s base hit off Warren Spahn drove in Stan Musial for the only run in the game. Wait! There’s much more, including describing the moment a famed announcer gave Hal his nickname!! Buy the book on this site or from the Butler Center.
