If the Wright brothers 1903 flights in Kitty Hawk marked the birth of aviation World War I can be called its violent adolescenceampamp151a brief but bloody era that completely changed the way planes were designed fabricated and flown. The war forged an industry that would redefine transportation and warfare for future generations. In First to Fly lauded historian Charles Bracelen Flood tells the story of the men who were at the forefront of that revolution the daredevil Americans of the Lafayette Escadrille who flew in French planes wore French uniforms and showed the world an American brand of heroism before the United States entered the Great War.As citizens of a neutral nation from 1914 to early 1917 Americans were prohibited from serving in a foreign army but many brave young souls soon made their way into European battle zones as ambulance drivers nurses and more dangerously as soldiers in the French Foreign Legion.