First Edition (June 1998), ISBN 0-9583693-1-3
Approx. A5 size (225mm x 175mm, 9 x 7 inches)
Hardback, 116 pages, illustrations from the author and Zeppelin Archives, courtesy of the Zeppelin Museum, Friedrichshafen
Published for the Lighter-Than-Air Institute by Tiola Consolidated Ltd, New Zealand

The LTAI has pleasure in presenting this work of scholarship by Professor Meyer. Already well-known for his earlier "Airshipmen Businessmen and Politics 1890-1940", this study of the Count examines the way in which his sense of honour was deeply affronted by his unjustified cashiering from the Army, which had been his whole life, and how he attempted to redeem himself by developing the rigid airship for the service of his country. Widely ridiculed in his early efforts, he went on to become the most celebrated German since Bismarck.

Professor Meyer makes the case very persuasively that had not the Count suffered such a traumatic experience in mid-life, and had the supreme strength of will to proceed, the rigid airship may not have been developed by him as it was. A fascinating study of a remarkable man and the times in which he lived.