Test Operations Section. Post war The first test flights Although assigned to Wright Field, he spent much of his time at Muroc Army Air Field, in California's high desert, testing a wide variety of experimental prototypes such as Douglas' highly unconventional pusher-prop light bomber, the XB-42 Mixmaster. In December 1945, he and Lieutenant Colonel Henry E. Warden set a new transcontinental speed record when they flew this airplane from Long Beach, California, to Bolling Air Force Base, in Washington, D.C., in just five hours, 17 minutes. In 1946, he was the principal project pilot for the jet-powered Convair XB-46 prototype bomber. It was also during this period that he acquired his first experience with a flying wing, as he familiarized himself with the flying qualities of the Northrop N-9M, a single-seat, one-third scale mock-up of the giant XB-35 prototype bomber. His superb skills as a pilot, engineer and officer were held in such high esteem that his immediate superior, Major Robert Cardenas, recommended him as project pilot for an unprecedented program—the first attempt to exceed the speed of sound in the Bell X-1. That assignment, however, went to Capt. Chuck Yeager. University Edwards was, instead, selected to be among the first to be sent to Princeton University for graduate study in the aeronautical sciences. The recent war had spawned truly revolutionary advances in aviation technology and it had become apparent to men such as Col. Albert Boyd, the chief of the Flight Test Division, that a new breed of military test pilot—one who combined the talents of a highly skilled pilot with the technical expertise of an engineer—would be required to effectively evaluate increasingly complex aircraft and onboard systems. Thus, when Glen Edwards graduated from Princeton with a Master of Science degree in Aeronautical Engineering in 1947, he represented one of the first of this new breed. Death In May 1948, Edwards was selected to join the team of test pilots and engineers at Muroc who were then evaluating the Northrop YB-49, the all-jet version of the exotic flying wing bomber. After his first few flights, he was not favorably impressed, confiding to his diary that it was "the darndest airplane I've ever tried to do anything with. Quite uncontrollable at times." Then, on June 5, 1948, he was flying as co-pilot with Maj. Daniel Forbes when the airplane departed from controlled flight and broke apart in the sky northwest