Pictures are out of the scheduled Air Displays theme for postage stamps due for release on Thursday 17 July 2008, Farnborough week.

The themes are:

1st   The Red Arrows
48p  The RAF Falcons
50p  Red Arrows Flypast
56P  Avro Vulcan prototypes and Avro 707s
72p  Robert Wyndham, the one-armed parachutist
81p  WB Moorehouse rounds the Beacon at Hendon Air Race

A diverse selection (except for two appearances of the Red Arrows), but what images would you have selected for the six values? 

Do you have a favourite 'Aviation' themed postage stamp in your collection?

An 80p stamp could have only depicted an ATP, if only it had performed at airshows.

 Thanks for including a link to our site. 

We've now added another image, that of the Royal Mail Sheet '100 Years of Aviation', which we think will be very popular.

 

Now here's a question - just who is this Robert Wyndham?  Google is remarkably silent, which means nothing on wikipedia either! 

He was apparently a member of Herts and Essex Aero Club (Though he appears to have trained elsewhere) since he's mentioned in the appendices of the book 'Wings Over Nazeing' available on Google books.

The caption for the stamp reads :

72p - Robert Wyndham, the One-armed Parachutist
This photograph, taken in 1933, shows the parachutist Robert Wyndham about to leap from an aircraft. Wyndham's fame was due to him having only one arm. Photograph Royal Aeronautical Society

Unfortunately I can't get the Flight archive to work properly at the moment but there do appear to be several references to a parachutist named Wyndham in 1933. The first is a Mr R. 'Wing' Wyndham and the second a Captain 'Wingy' Wyndham, presumably these two are the same chap but I've no idea if it's also our enigmatic one-armed showman!!

Flight International ,   July 27, 1933

http://www.flightglobal.com/pdfarchive/view/1933/1933%20-%200220.html?search=robert+wyndham

Flight International,   November 2, 1933

http://www.flightglobal.com/pdfarchive/view/1933/1933%20-%200919.html?search=Wyndham+parachute

 

Flight International,   November 9, 1933

http://www.flightglobal.com/pdfarchive/view/1933/1933%20-%200971.html?search=Wyndham

 

 The designs are okay. Are these stamps available in the market now? direct mail mailers

 Robert Wyndham, the One-armed Parachutist-  Am I the only one who has wondered if the missing arm was on the side where the D- ring was fitted? Or would that be OK, as he had to reach across to pull the handle?  I have this vision of him falling down, and discovering that the D-ring had been fitted on the wrong side....

  What next, the headless wing walker, after a low loop??  You will be telling me then that there was a pilot with no legs...

 

Cheers Eclipse