A photo essay tracing the history and development of aircraft from hot-air balloons to jetliners. Includes information on the principles of flight and the inner workings of various flying machines.

"Six months before the famous Wright Brothers' first flight, Aída de Acosta became the first woman to fly a powered aircraft."--

Explains some of the wonderful developments in the world of aircraft, past and present, in peacetime and in war.

This charming history of aviation covers every contraption that flies in one spectacular comic album about our conquest of the skies.

"Discover how far the first airplane flew, what a barnstormer did, and what keeps an airplane up in the air"--Jacket.

This book will send you sky-high. Are you in a flap to discover who put a parachute on a puppy? Why scientists fire dead birds from cannon? What happened to the world's first flying sheep? If you think you can stomach the sick side of Science, then read on as we go plane crazy. Laugh at some seriously silly flying stunts, find out which scientist was blown up in a balloon, and learn how to build a world-beating plane.

Describes seventeen twentieth-century historic flights and their pilots, from the Wright brothers to those of the space shuttles.

Profiles Brazilian aviator Alberto Santos-Dumont, who made great strides in the invention of flight.