Quality, illustrated, essential NZ History book.

New Zealand's first aeroplane flights and why the accepted 'first flight' story has been wrong for a nearly a century.

The First revises long-standing myths around New Zealand's aviation pioneers and the amazing challenges and accidents they faced.

For the first time, the lives of the team of talented men and women who helped Leo and Vivian Walsh are told.

How Kings College played such an important role in flying.

Corrects and identifies new photographs of the Walshes and their operations.

The real political story behind New Zealand's first air mail flight which took place on the eve of a national election.

The Walsh sisters and their connections with Jean Batten.

The First covers tobacco cultivation and manufacturing in the 1870s, the Victorian bicycle craze, the first motorcars, the Glenora Park flights and the upheaval of war and its aftermath when aeroplane flight was experienced by ordinary New Zealanders.

Digital 3V scale illustrations of all the Walsh flying machines based on photographs and references. llustration by Rosie Louise.

Book is hardback, 256 pages with over fifty full-colour illustrations.

Auckland, Dargaville, Mangawhai, Mission Bay, Kohimarama, Whangarei, Hastings, Wellington, Christchurch, Napier,Hamilton, Kaitaia, Dunedin. King's college