Jean Batten (1909 - 1982)

General websites

Here are some reliable websites with lots of information about her life and aviation achievements.

Te Ara: The Encyclopedia of New Zealand

Te Ara is an excellent starting point for all questions about New Zealand Aotearoa. It has information covering Jean Batten's life, her flying career leading to her long distance flights, and her relationship with her mother.

• Go down the page to the section called Biographies and select Dictionary of New Zealand Biography.
• Enter the keywords 'Jean Batten'.
• Choose Batten, Jean Gardner.

NZHistory

This is another great website for New Zealand topics. If we go all the way down the page we can see that the website belongs to the Ministry for Culture & Heritage, so the information is well-researched and reliable.

• Search for Jean Batten to find her biography.

Tips: We like sites like this because they’re reliable. You can tell because of their web address – they have either .govt or .ac, meaning they are from government or educational organisations. They’re also New Zealand sites, so relevant for us.

NZEDGE Legends

NZEDGE was set up by a New Zealand businessman to celebrate New Zealand culture, innovation and achievement.

• Look down the list of Legends to find the story about Jean Batten.

Tips: Websites that have .com or .co in the address can have good information, but you need to assess how reliable it is. Check the About link on the website, if you can find one. That can tell you what the company’s mission and values are.

Articles and primary sources

These sites are good for finding in-depth articles and primary sources. Primary sources are things like letters, images, diaries, and other documents created during that period of history or soon after by people who were there.

DigitalNZ

DigitalNZ is a search site that focuses on New Zealand history and brings together results from lots of different websites. It’s an easy way of searching online resources from New Zealand libraries, museums, universities and government sites all at once, and has lots of primary sources.

• Search for 'Jean Batten'.
• You can choose from a collection of Images, Audio or Video clips.
• Watch the videos Jean Batten - The Garbo of the Skies or Jean from NZ On Screen.

Tips: There are restrictions on which photos you can freely use because of copyright issues. Use the 'Usage' tab to help you find the ones you can use.

New Zealand Geographic Online

This is one of the EPIC resources, a set of reliable databases covering lots of different topics. You may need a password from your school or local library to access it. This archive is the entire collection of the New Zealand Geographic Magazine and has a lot of information on a wide variety of topics including.

• Search for 'Jean Batten'.
• Find a comprehensive article about Jean Batten.

Biography (Gale In Context)

Another EPIC resource, this overseas site has a mix of different sources.

• Search for Jean Batten to bring up the topic page about her.
• Select Read more under the overview for a good biography.
• Look further down the page for magazine and newspaper articles as well as biographies.

Tips: To get to the EPIC resources you will need a password from your school librarian first. Or you can chat with one of our AnyQuestions librarians between 1 and 6pm Monday to Friday and they will help you online. Some EPIC databases may also be available through your public library.

Books

There have been many books written about Jean Batten. Check out your local public or school library to see what they have. Some recommended titles are:

• Sky high : Jean Batten's incredible flying adventures by David Hill
• Jean Batten by Kevin Boon
• Jean Batten : the Garbo of the Skies by Ian MacKersey
• Solo Flight by Jean Batten
• We are explorers : extraordinary women who discovered the world by Kari Herbert.

SCIS no: 1845871