My first little WWI planes reference book

[Robin]

Bought in 1969....I was 9. This is also the oldest book I still own.
It's a Dutch translation...first published in English by Blandford Press in 1967.
73 colour profiles of WWI planes.





Robin

[Thumbs up]

I had this book to! I was astonished to find out that there were other aircraft other than what Airfix kitted!Great illustrations!

[ermeio]

you've pretty the same memories of mine.
during the '70s I bought the same book -in italian at the stand of a well known chatolic presshouse  on the beach

[Jeff K]

my first WWI planes book wasn't a reference book, it was Ernst Udet's memoir. that got me interested in WWI planes.

well, to be fair, Snoopy had a role in that too...

[Rip Van Winkle]

My first reference book was  aircraft of WW1 by Kenneth Munson.  I received it for x-mas 1968. I still have it.

[macsporran]

I had the Blandford book too - even used their colour scheme for the Eduard 1/48 Fokker D.VI when it first came out!
Only later did I begin to doubt it......
Sandy

[pierrelm]

My first WWI reference was the Hippo pocket-sized title, bought I'm sure from the WH Smiths new kiosk on Peterborough station. A title that has now been with me for over 50 years and is still cherished - when I think 'Hannover' or D.VII it's the images from this well thumbed titled which first come to mind.

The Blandford books were discovered, to almost disbelief at my local library - a real treasue trove, although even back then, the colours we a little too vivd to seem real. Luckily, we now know everything there is to know about WWI colours and camouflage. 

[lone modeller]

Evening All,

Like pierrelm I too have a much loved (and thumbed) copy of the Hippo book, and its WW2 partner. I cannot remember how old I was when I bought it - probably in my early teens - but one photo always stuck in my mind because it was of a type that I badly wanted to have as a model but could not. It was the Maurice Farman 7 Longhorn:



Approximately 50 years later I decided that the photo needed to be brought to life, so I scratch built my own MF 7! (there is a build log on this site).

Another volume that I bought a little later was this:



Note the price - 4/6d - approximately 23 pence in modern Sterling, but at the time a considerable sum, especially when all I had was 3/- a week pocket money! Still a treasure trove though.

At Christmas 1966 my brother gave me this:



which really aroused my interest in the aviation of this period. What Funderburk left out though was the intense cold, oil all over the goggles and face from a rotary engine, unreliable engines and jammed guns, and all the other non-glamorous aspects of early flying. Still a very good read though, especially for a boy in his mid-teens.

Stephen.

[Vickers]

Great thread! I didn't have many books when I was little, but I remember that the first book I read was a paperback version of "Iron Men With Wooden Wings". Many of the books already noted in this thread were available at either my school or well-stocked public library and hauling stacks of them to and fro was probably my very first workout regimen.