Timehost: Welcome to the TIME room! We're very pleased to have with us today author Reeve Lindbergh, the daughter of aviator legend Charles Lindbergh, the man who made the first nonstop solo flight in "The Spirit of St. Louis" from New York to Paris in 1927. Charles Lindbergh has been named by TIME as one of the most inspiring figures of the 20th century in our TIME 100 Heroes and Icons special issue. Ms. Lindbergh is joining us today to talk about her father and her own experiences growing up in the Lindbergh family, recently published in the book "Under a Wing." Welcome, Ms. Lindbergh.

Reeve_Lindbergh: Thank you very much.

Timehost: Let's go to our first question...

birdowenasks: What would have been your father's reaction to being named among the 20 most influential heroes of the 20th century?

Reeve_Lindbergh: I think he would have been astonished. He followed his interests in a very focused way and went on in his life in a way that he left the past behind and he was not too interested in his reputation as a world figure. He was more interested in what he was doing than in what he had done.

Moscow_Maudasks: What was the single biggest advantage to being the daughter of Charles and Anne Morrow Lindbergh?

Reeve_Lindbergh: It was always very interesting. They felt very much that the family was the most important thing in their lives. I would rate that the highest of everything they had to give us. In fact they said that of all the things to happen in your life, family will be the most important element.

birdowenasks: In your book, you write that your father encouraged all of his children to fly. What was the attraction that aviation held for him and how did he get into flying to begin with?

Reeve_Lindbergh: Aviation combined elements that he loved: Technology and adventure and access to a wilderness of sky and territory that had not been explored. There was really technology and freedom combined. This was true for many young people of the time - a sense of freedom and excitement about brand new technology.

Almost_Heaven_West_Virginiaasks: What did your father think of the exploration of space? Did he ever consider becoming an astronaut, or getting involved in the NASA program somehow?

Reeve_Lindbergh: He did become involved in the NASA programs because he was fascinated with space travel. He became interested in space travel as early as the 1930s and he became involved in the space program in the 1960s. He was quite fascinated with space.

Louisk39 asks: Did your father ever say he regretted his fame? Do you ever think the family might have been happier had he not made the first transatlantic flight?

Reeve_Lindbergh: I don't think he regretted the flight ever. I don't think he expected the fame at all. It was a tremendous burden to him. I don't think he would have given up the flight. He was always willing to take the consequences of that action and he did spend his life coming to terms with it. It was a tremendous burden to him.

Louisk39 asks: Have you been invited to any of the anniversary celebrations of the Paris flight? Do people in France, say, still idolize your father?

Reeve_Lindbergh: Yes I've been invited to all of them. I think there is a lingering affection for my father in France. And there continues to be a relationship between the town where he grew up in Minnesota and the town where he landed in France.

Timehost: Celebrity , in fact, though, led to one of the greatest tragedies of Lindbergh's life and one of the most sensational crimes of this century...

birdowen asks: How did your family handle the kidnapping of Charles Lindbergh, Jr.?

Reeve_Lindbergh: This happened before any of the rest of the children were born. We had no direct connection to it. The way we were impacted was by how we were brought up: completely removed from the famous parts of my parents' lives. We had no direct contact with the event, but felt it in how we were protected. They were very careful with us. They tried to give us normal, but private lives.

Timehost: But yet in your book, "Under a Wing," you write that you think your brother's death was an accident. Could you elaborate?

Reeve_Lindbergh: I do think so. I think we have always felt that the intent was never to kill the child, and that the ladder broke when the man who was holding the child was coming down. That's pretty well borne out in the evidence. I never think of it as a murder but as a negligent homicide.

birdowen asks: Why did the Lindbergh kidnapping take such a hold on the American public?

Reeve_Lindbergh: I can't answer that question, but the focus on my parents was so great that the kidnapping became a kind of sensation that to a certain extent was dehumanized. I don't know why it happend the way it did. It's like the Princess Diana phenomenon.

tweetsie_1969 asks: You write that you never saw any indication of anti-Semitism in your father at home, and that you were shocked by his 1941 speech naming the Jews as one of the groups trying to put the US into World War II. What prompted your father to make this speech and why do you believe its meaning was misinterpreted?

Timehost: And could you explain briefly what the speech was?

Reeve_Lindbergh: The speech was in 1941 in Des Moines and for the America First movement, which was trying to keep the US out of the war. I think the reason he made the speech was that he, like a majority of people, wanted the US out of WWII. The isolation opinion was strong. He was not in a minority. I also did not know that it was common language to "single out the Jews." To me, growing up, singling out a group was unaccepatble. But I have been told that this was a fairly common way to talk. I found it difficult to come to terms with the speech. There are other writings by my father in which I find a lot of racism and anti-semitism. I don't think he believed it was anti-semitism but there are overtones of it in the speech.

Timehost: Going back to the Lindbergh baby kidnapping for a second...

kidsc asks: Was Bruno Hauptmann the real killer?

Timehost: The question is in reference to the man who was executed for killing Charles Lindbergh, Jr.

Reeve_Lindbergh: The evidence is very strong in favor of his involvement. But the question is, "Was anyone else involved?" The biographer who just won the Pulizer for his book on my father, A. Scott Berg, thought he could clear Hauptmann, but came out of the biography saying he was guilty.

Stamm444 asks: Was Charles Lindbergh's attraction to the America-First crowd due to his political naivete? Or did he believe Germany was too powerful for the US to fight?

Reeve_Lindbergh: He believed that it was not in the Amerian interest to enter a European war. He did think Germany was very powerful and felt that it was best if Germany and Russia slugged it out and that we stayed out of it.

tweetsie_1969 asks: How were your mother's air travels with your father as a navigator and co-pilot perceived by the American public at that "unliberated " time?

Timehost: Could you first give us some background to these interesting travels?

Reeve_Lindbergh: My mother was greatly admired at that time for her role as co-pilot. It seemed to be one area where women could be acknowledged. She found great freedom in the air. She was invaluable as a navigator and communicator. She was also the first woman to receive a glider's liscence in the US. That was a time in which women could excell in that area, and she did.

Timehost: Ms.Lindbergh's mother was Anne Morrow Lindbergh, a noted writer.

rb67h asks: Is there a possibility that you or someone else will continue your mother's diaries and letters sometime in the future?

Reeve_Lindbergh: Yes, there certainly is a strong possiblity. I think that would be important work that should be done.

Timehost: How would you go about organizing the work? What would be the scope?

Reeve_Lindbergh: I don't know yet. She has left a great deal of material that one would need to go after carefuly and in her spirit.

Almost_Heaven_West_Virginia asks: You write that your father used to say he'd rather have birds than airplanes if he had to choose. You would expect the opposite. What led him to say this?

Reeve_Lindbergh: A lifetime of interacting with technology and nature led him to believe that if he had to choose, he would choose birds. This was the message of a person who learned to know the 20th century, where balancing technology with the natural environment was an important job and he left it to us to reconcile the two.

Stamm444 asks: Did you travel a lot when you were a child? Did your father do the flying?

Reeve_Lindbergh: I travelled a little when I was a child and I flew with my father locally. We mostly were at home in Connecticut growing up quietly. I didn't travel much until my teens.

Timehost: Who taught your father to fly?

Reeve_Lindbergh: I think he learned at Brooks and Kelly Field. I think several people taught him at age 18. Flying the mail taught him a lot. He desperately wanted to fly, but I don't remeber one single teacher. He was flying in the west. I'm actually not clear on his early avaiation history. The Scott Berg book has everything, or read "The Spirit of St. Louis," in which my father recorded everything. I'm sure it's all right there. It describes his early aviation career.

sergei997 asks: What do you think would be for your father a real challenge if he would be living nowadays?

Reeve_Lindbergh: If he were alive now, there would be countless challenges. He was challenged by population growth, the destruction of habitat of all living creatures, pollution, national and international conflict. He became interested in global events and issues as he got older and that would not have stopped. He would have continued to be aware of the challenges facing the whole planet.

Timehost: Any closing comments before we end?

Reeve_Lindbergh: I'd like to say I think the reason people are interested in my father is because he represented Americans and an age when we came out of our rural beginnings and entered the technological age. I think his journey is the journey of all of us.

Timehost: Thank you very much for being with us, Ms. Lindbergh.

Reeve_Lindbergh: Thank you.

TIME 100: Heroes & Icons