Martin Caidin was an American author and an authority on aeronautics and aviation.
Caidin wrote more than 50 books, including Samurai!, Black Thursday, Thunderbolt!, Fork-Tailed Devil: The P-38, Zero!, The Ragged, Rugged Warriors, A Torch to the Enemy and many other works of military history. He wrote more than 1,000 magazine articles. Caidin established his own company to promote aeronautical subjects for a young audience and began writing fiction in 1957.
He twice won the Aviation/Space Writers Association award as the outstanding author in the field of aviation. Among his other honors, he was made an honorary member of the U.S. Army's Golden Knights parachute demonstration team; flew for several months with the U.S. Air Force Thunderbirds demonstration squadron; and set the world record for the number of people deployed for a wing-walk — nineteen — on one wing of an airplane on November 14, 1981.