"The desire to fly is an idea handed down to us by our ancestors who looked enviously on the birds soaring freely through space on the infinite highway of the air." Wilbur WrightThe twentieth century was still in its infancy when the Wright Brothers famously changed the course of human history in late 1903 when they achieved the elusive first-ever powered flight. Their "Wright Flyer" was airborne for just 12 seconds but it was long enough to change everything. This comprehensive volume celebrates the incredible and rapid evolution of the magnificent flying machines that have eagerly followed in the slipstream of the "Flyer" over the intervening century and more. From the WWI era of the inimitable Sopwith Camel and feared Fokker D.VII to their WWII successors, the formidable Messerschmitt Bf 109 and iconic Spitfire, and into a new commercial age dominated by Lockheed, Boeing and Airbus, the incredible advance in aircraft technology since the 1900s has been inexorable.