16 Facts About Gladys Sandford

Gladys Sandford was an Australian-New Zealand pioneering driver and aviator.

Gladys Sandford was the first woman in New Zealand to earn a pilot's licence.

Gladys Sandford's father had immigrated from England, and her mother was from South Australia.

Gladys Sandford became a school teacher and taught at Napier, in New Zealand's North Island.

Gladys Sandford married William Henning, a motor salesman, in 1912, and worked with him in their car sales business, learning about cars and engines as she worked.

In 1914, World War I broke out, and Henning, and two of Gladys Sandford's brothers, enlisted in the New Zealand Expeditionary Force.

Gladys Sandford tried to enlist as a driver, but was turned down.

Gladys Sandford worked as an ambulance driver for a hospital in Giza.

Gladys Sandford was promoted to head lady driver, and after the war finished she stayed on in England to lead the motor transport division at the New Zealand military hospital outside London.

Gladys Sandford developed influenza and was discharged in January 1919.

Gladys Sandford's husband had died in 1918, and her two brothers had died, so she returned to Australia alone.

Gladys Sandford went back to her former role in car sales and taught her customers to drive.

Gladys Sandford decided to learn to fly, and took lessons with the New Zealand Permanent Air Force, as the Royal New Zealand Air Force was then called, in Christchurch.

Gladys Sandford became a vice-president of the Sydney branch of the New Zealand Returned Soldiers' Association, and visited sick and distressed soldiers and their families.

Gladys Sandford died on 24 October 1971 at the Repatriation General Hospital, Concord.

In 2016, war historian Glyn Harper and illustrator Jenny Cooper published a children's book about Sandford's life, entitled Gladys Goes to War.