Book Description

“This well-researched book evocatively conjures up the halcyon days of the swashbuckling amateurs who took to the skies in untested contraptions.” —Sussex Life magazine Shoreham airport, founded in 1910, is the oldest airport in the UK and the oldest purpose-built commercial airport in the world. Yet aviation began in Sussex far earlier, with balloonists making landfall at Kingsfold near Horsham in 1785. The Dawn of Aviation recounts, in vivid style, the way in which successive generations of men—and women—carved out within the ancient and delightful county of Sussex, a memorable place in the history of British aviation. From balloons of the last 18th century, which were later employed by the military in 1880, to kites that could life a man into the air, to unmanned gliders, to the powered, controlled flight made possible by internal combustion engines in 1908, when Alec Ogilvie flew a Wright Brothers biplane along the coast at Camber, this well-researched, engaging account will appeal to aviation enthusiasts and British history buffs alike. “An enjoyable and informative account of how flying originally came to the attractive corner of the UK.” —The Aviation Historian