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Only the adventurous and the wealthy patronized the first companies to inaugurate air services to the continent in 1919. They flew in primitive converted military machines and could expect their flight or be interrupted by an unscheduled landing in a field when bad weather or an engine problem was encountered. The fledgeling airlines operated on the edge of bankruptcy because the government refused to offer finance. The French and German governments susidised their own airlines to provide themselves with a military reserve.
In the early 1920s, British civil aviation was under the control of a myriad of companies, both large and small, set up immediately after the war. It was realized that this plethora of companies was doing nothing for the advancement of civil aviation. As a result, Imperial Airways was formed to be Britain's national airline. From its small beginnings in an office at Victoria station, to the heady days of the Empire flying boats, Imperial Airways rapidly opened routes throughout the world. John Stroud's book details for the first time in one source all of the many aircraft that have flown for Imperial Airways. This includes details of what happened to them and their careers.
Imperial Airways is a name redolent of the excitement and glamour of the pioneering years of flight. Founded in the 1920s, Imperial Airways flew to destinations all over the world. This beautiful and evocative book on the 'golden age' of passenger flight is the result of years of research, and the text is complemented by a wealth of stunning photographs and ephemera. It will be the most definitive book published on the history of Imperial Airways and the formative years of British commercial aviation.
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The new activity of trans-continental civil flying in the 1930s is a useful vantage point for viewing the extension of British imperial attitudes and practices. Cultures and caricatures of British imperial aviation examines the experiences of those (mostly men) who flew solo or with a companion (racing or for leisure), who were airline passengers (doing colonial administration, business or research), or who flew as civilian air and ground crews. For airborne elites, flying was a modern and often enviable way of managing, using and experiencing empire. On the ground, aviation was a device for asserting old empire: adventure and modernity were accompanied by supremacism. At the time, however, British civil imperial flying was presented romantically in books, magazines and exhibitions. Eighty years on, imperial flying is still remembered, reproduced and re-enacted in caricature.
This remarkable book pictures the growth of British civil air transport from its inception in 1910 through to the formation of Imperial Airways in 1934 and then the beginnings of British Overseas Airways Corporation. The author shows the impetus given to aircraft production by the First World War, and presents a careful account of the operational and financial fortunes of each of the four principal British airlines which began operations shortly thereafter. The fight against official apathy and lack of foresight on the part of the government, the campaign for subsidies and the struggle with foreign competition are interestingly presented. The development of the chosen-instrument concept in G...