___ Yeager completed his first powered flight – a familiarization flight to Mach 1.15 – the day after a civilian test pilot's record flight, on 21 November. On his next flight to Mach 1.5, on 2 December, he reported excessively heavy stick forces. Then, on December 8 he flew the X-1A to a speed of Mach 1.9 in a slight climb at 60,000 feet. Apart from the heavy stick forces, everything had gone smoothly to this point. Following this third flight, however, Bell engineers warned him to fly with extreme caution because the airplane might well “go divergent” at speeds above Mach 2.3. Nevertheless, in the spirit of that now-bygone age, they pushed ahead to an “optimum climb path,” max-performance profile just four days later, on 12 December. ___ What occurred that day is well known – recreated in purple prose by pulp writers and on celluloid by Hollywood. Those efforts, however, are really not as compelling – or as interesting and, perhaps, even instructive – as the words of the participants. What follows is the record as preserved in the pilot’s report and the official transcript of the radio communications that day. Jack Ridley was flying low chase and Maj. Arthur “Kit” Murray high chase, both in F-86s, and Maj. Harold Russell was the B-29 launch pilot.