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Aviation History
1937
1937 - 1164.PDF
434 FLIGHT. MAY 6, 1937. IQH -1937 A Review of the Progress in British Aircraft Design Since the Last Coronation. Section I : Up to the End of the War Period (Illustrated mainly with " Flight " Photographs.) TO appreciate British flying as it existed when His Majesty King George V was crowned on June 22, 1911, it is necessary to go back to the beginning of that year, and to call attention to certain facts and circumstances which formed the background against which contem poraneous events must be viewed if a true picture is to be formed. British aviation had been struggling along for a couple of years or so with scant encouragement from the Govern ment, and such flying as was carried out was done mostly by wealthy amateurs or by the test pilots of a few of the aircraft firms-then in exist ence. In this connection it may be of interest to recall that in its issue of February n, 1911, Flight published a list of "Aviators' Certificates" as issued by the Royal Aero Club. The list, which numbered 55, began with the name of Lt. Col. J. T. C. Moore- Brabazon, whose certificate was num bered 1. Several who are not only still alive but who are still connected with flying appeared in that list. To men tion but a few, the following names appeared, with the numbers of their certificates: Claude Grahame-White (6), G. C. Colmore (15), A. V. Roe ^18), F. K. McClean (21), T. Sopwitii (31), Sydney E. Smith (33), A. R. Low (34), Lt. G. B. Hynes (40), and G. de Havilland (53). Records The position of world's records at the beginning of the year gives an indication of the stage reached by flying. A French pilot, Leblanc, had covered 50 km. (31 miles) in just under 28 minutes (66.75 m.p.h.). An Englishman, Claude Grahame-White, on a French Bleriot monoplane, had covered 100 km. 62 miles) in 1 hour 1 minute at an average speed of just over 60 m.p.h. A Frenchman, M. Tabuteau, on a Maurice Farman biplane, had covered a distance of 585 km. (363 miles) non-stop, and Henry Farman, on one of his own biplanes, had remained in the air for 8 hours 12 minutes and 47I seconds (note the two-fifths of a second!). The very greatest speed ever attained over a short straight-line course was 115.3 km./h. (71.75 m.p.h.) by Leblanc on a Bleriot, and the world's height record stood at 3,497 m. (11,474 KM? This last record looks a good deal better than the others, and stood to the credit of A. Hoxey, an American, on a Wright biplane. It will be observed that, with the exception of Grahame- White, not a single Englishman figured rpHE scope of a historical review such as the one presented in this issue of " Flight " is so wide that it is more convenient to sectionise it. From 1011 to 1914 there were virtually no military aircraft; from 1914 to 1918 all machines were of this kind: and after 1918 there began a divergence, gradual at first, into two distinct classes, military and civil. The present article pages 434-140) deals with the development up to the end of the war. Of the diverging branches, military development since the war is reviewed on pages 440a~447. Civil aircraft development since that time is divided into commercial and non-commercial types pages 448-451). Further, on pages 454 and 455 will be found some historical notes on British air transport and its instrumental equipment. in the list of records, and "G.-W." was flying a French machine. The British Government had not begun to realise the significance of flying, and military aviation was to all intents and purposes non-existent until a small start was made in Feb ruary, 1911, with the establishment by the War Office of the Air Battalion " with a view to meeting Army require ments consequent on recent develop ments in aerial science." The Air Battalion was a section of the Royal Engineers. Several flying schools existed around the country at the beginning of 1911, the most notable training centres being Brooklands, Hendon, Eastchurch (Isle of Sheppey), Laffan's Plain and Salis bury Plain. The schools were mostly operated by aircraft manufacturing firms, of which at that time there were a ba're dozen. In view of the small notice which both the Government and the general public took in flying in those days, it is interesting and not a little significant to recall that His Majesty King George V, who had succeeded to the throne on May 6 of the previous year, ex pressed the wish to see an all-Britisli aeroplane at Windsor Castle, and in vited Mr. T. O. M. Sopwith to make the visit. On February 1, 1911, Mr Sopwith duly flew from Brooklands to Windsor in his Howard Wright biplane with 60 h.p. E.N.V. engine. The sig nificance of the flight lies in the fact that His Majesty particularly wished
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