['Flighty', First World War magazine of the Royal Naval Air Service (Kingsnorth Airship Station).] Complete run of seventeen issues, each filled with features, cartoons, illustrations, features, gossip. bound in one volume with some covers.

Issues of this magazine are excessively scarce, and a full run would appear to be well-nigh unique. The only other copy traced, either on COPAC or on WorldCat, is at the Imperial War Museum (whose inadequate entry implies that it only holds a single issue, stating that it 'lacks advertisement pages before page 1'). The seventeen issues present in this set (vol. 1 nos. 1-12; vol. 2 nos. 1-5) total 448pp., 4to, in a contemporary textured blue-cloth binding, with 'FLIGHTY | KINGSNORTH | AIRSHIP | STATION | 1917-18' in faded gilt on spine (binder's note in pencil on last page). In good condition, on lightly aged and worn paper. Both a historical artefact and a valuable source of information. Profusely illustrated with photographs of individuals and groups, and cartoons (principally by Jack B. Linklater), and with advertisements throughout, ranging from the local ('H. Stopps & Son, High Street, Hoo, High Class English Butcher') to such London firms as Gamages, Gieves & Hawkes and Mappin & Webb. Also included are the front cover of the first issue (printed in blue with cartoon by Harry A. Tanner), the frontispiece to that issue (a photographic portrait of Admiral Sir George A. Callaghan), the cover to the Christmas 1917 issue (with cartoon by Jack B. Linklater), and the (misplaced) cover of the Christmas 1918 issue (with illustration by Leslie A. Burnett). Each issue is passed by the censor (named in early issues as Lieutenant-Commander Mackenzie, RN). The editor of the first issue is Ben Abrahams, and thereafter it is H. W. Elliott, the latter assisted by others from April 1918. Each issue carries an editorial and list of staff. The text includes features on individuals, often with photographs (either in individually-titled articles or in a regular column titled 'Who's Who at Kingsnorth'), reports ('Y.M.C.A. Notes'; 'Christmas Day at Kingsnorth'), articles ('Are Airships Worth While? By C. G. Grey, Editor of the "Aeroplane"'; 'Some Impressions of Pulham Air Station. By L. Horscroft. L.M.'; '"April 23rd, 1918." An eye-witness account of the attack on Zeebrugge' by Chaplain C. J. E. Peshall, RN; 'Kingsnorth in Pre-War Days'; 'My First Aeroplane Flight' by 'Duggie'), poetry ('Putting In a Request' by J.W.L. and H.W.E.; 'The Sergeant-Major's Car' by 'Ben'), reviews of sporting events and scores (cricket, billiards, boxing, cross-country running) and entertainments (several relating to the Kingsnorth Concert Party, 'The Black and Whites'; 'Our Kinema'; 'Cinema Notes'), news of former colleagues (in a column entitled 'From Near and Far') obituaries, short stories ('An Armistice Day Episode' by 'Daphne'; 'Poisoned Wells' by H. Wilson Temple; 'Three Tales' by 'R.D.C.'); gossip ('What the Guards hear' and 'Ward Room Whispers by Lieutenant Gossip') and 'Answers to Correspondents'. From the collection of S. Maurice Evans, MBE, ARIBA, ARICS, Group Architect and County Chief Rescue Officer, Middlesex County Council, who was stationed at Kingsnorth towards the end of the war.