A gentlemen's club in the clouds : Reassessing the Empire Air Mail Scheme, 1933-1939

Journal of Transport History

Volumn 28, Issue 1, 2007, Pages 75-92

  Ewer, Peter ^a  

^a NONE   (Australia)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

AIR TRANSPORTATION; COMPETITIVENESS; ECONOMIC INSTABILITY; POLITICAL DISCOURSE; TECHNOLOGICAL CHANGE; TRANSPORTATION DEVELOPMENT; TRANSPORTATION HISTORY; TRANSPORTATION PLANNING; TRANSPORTATION POLICY;

EURASIA; EUROPE; UNITED KINGDOM; WESTERN EUROPE;

EID: 34247895419     PISSN: 00225266     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.7227/TJTH.28.1.6     Document Type: Review

References (64)

1. F. van der Linden Airlines and Air Mail: the Post Office and the Birth of the Commercial Aviation Industry (Lexington KY, 2002).
2. For Herman Goering's determination to mould German aviation in the image of Nazism see R. Overy, Goering: the Iron Man (London, 1984).
3. For Soviet use of aviation as a propaganda tool see S. Palmer, 'Peasants into pilots: Soviet air-mindedness as an ideology of dominance', Technology and Culture 41, 1 (2000), 1-26.
4. A. J. Quin-Harkin, 'Imperial Airways, 1924-1940', Journal of Transport History 1 (1954), 197-215.
5. R. Higham, Britain's Imperial Air Routes, 1918 to 1939: the Story of Britain's Overseas Airlines (London, 1960), p. 224 and p. 314.
6. Ibid., especially chapter XVI.
7. L. Edmonds, 'Australia, Britain and the Empire Air Mail Scheme, 1934-1938', Journal of Transport History 20, 2 (1999), 99-106, here p. 101 and p. 104.
8. G. Pirie, 'Passenger traffic in the 1930s on British imperial air routes: refinement and revision'. Journal of Transport History 25, 1 (2004), 63-83.
9. A. Nahum, 'Two-stroke or turbine? The Aeronautical Research Committee and British aero-engine development in World War II', Technology and Culture 38, 2 (1997), 312-54.
10. See E. Hobsbawm, Industry and Empire: from 1750 to the Present Day (London, 1999; first published 1968).
11. Ibid., especially chapter 11.
12. Higham, Britain's Imperial Air Routes,
13. and generally also R. E. G. Davies, A History of the World's Airlines (London, 1964).
14. See Marc Dierikx, 'Hard work living off the air: Albert Plesman's KLM in international aviation, 1919-1953', in W Trimble (ed.), Pioneers and Operators: from Airships to Airbus II (Washington DC, 1995), pp. 221-44, here p. 233.
15. See National Archives, Kew (hereafter NA), AVIA 2/1894.
16. NA, AVIA 2/1886, H. Fitzmaurice, Consul General, Batavia, to Arthur Henderson, PC, MP, 15 May 1931.
17. J. Gunn, The Defeat of Distance: QANTAS, 1919-1939 (St Lucia, Qld, 1985), p. 141.
18. Sir Eric Geddes, 'The Future of Civil Air Communications of the Empire', copy sighted at NA, AVIA 2/636.
19. Ibid., p. 18.
20. Few other leading civil operators made Geddes's mistake. German air strategists identified speed as the cornerstone of their commercial formula in 1925, see Davies, A History of the World's Airlines.
21. Likewise, US policy favoured fast landplanes, see van der Linden, Airlines and Air Mail.
22. Geddes, 'Future of Civil Air Communications of the Empire', p. 21.
23. British Airways Museum, Heathrow (hereafter BAM), AW 1/2760, Imperial Airways: Empire Air Mail Facilities, 19 January 1934.
24. BAM, AW 1/2758, Empire Air Mail Scheme (Scheme M) Operational and Costs Data, 4 June 1934.
25. Transcript at BAM, AW 1/2758, which also has Londonderry's private views on operating speeds, at Minute, 2 January 1935.
26. Gunn, The Defeat of Distance, chapter 10.
27. NA, AVIA 2/1912, 'Notes for consideration'.
28. Ibid., F. H. Williamson to D. Banks, 28 February 1935.
29. NA, AVIA 2/1920, Archdale Parkhill to F. G. Bertram, 21 June 1935.
30. NA, AVIA 2/1912, Aide Memoire handed to Mr Bruce, Negotiations with the Commonwealth Government regarding the Empire Air Mail Scheme, 16 December 1935.
31. NA, AVIA 2/1964, 'Flying Boat Air Mail Route, Sydney to Darwin', RAAF report, 2 March 1936.
32. The exchange between Australian and British officials over mail loads in April-May 1936 can be found at National Archives of Australia, Melbourne and Canberra (hereafter NAA), MP 274/1 7/118/17.
33. BAM, AW 1/2772, Revised Estimates for the Empire Air Mail Scheme, 6 May 1936.
34. BAM, AW 1/2678, T. I. Gardiner, General Post Office Headquarters, to George Woods Humphery, 18 December 1936.
35. See P. Ewer, 'Servants of the national interest? Conservatives and aviation policy making in the 1930s', Australian Historical Studies (forthcoming).
36. See I. Mackersey, Smithy: the Life of Sir Charles Kingsford Smith (London, 1998), p. 337.
37. Gunn, Defeat of Distance (see note 15).
38. Copy held at NA, AVIA 2/1156, Empire Air Mail Scheme: Ground Organisation in Australia.
39. Ibid.
40. Ibid., F. G. Bertram, 4 August 1937, Minute 28.
41. Ibid., J. M. Spaight to Official Secretariat of High Commission, 29 August 1937.
42. Ibid., Minute by F. G. Bertram, 19 August 1937.
43. NA, AVIA 2/1156, Final Schedule, 12 October 1937.
44. The order and costing for the first set of launches are at NAA, MP 131/1 192/119/486.
45. NAA, MP 347/1 22/104/68, C. E. Lowther, Control Officer, Groote Eylandt Flying Boat Base, to Director General of Civil Aviation, 29 January 1939.
46. See NAA, A461 J314/1/5 Part 3.
47. See Dierikx, 'Hard work living off the air' (note 12).
48. NA, AVIA 2/1444, 'Christmas Mails 1938: Notes on the Operations', appreciation dated 24 February 1939.
49. NAA, MP 273/1 1938/12525, 'Empire Air Mail Service: Notes concerning the Treatment of Mails during the 1938 Christmas Period', VK Harry, Chief Inspector, Postal Services, 10 January 1939.
50. NA, AVIA 2/1276, 'Schedule of Delays on England-Africa Air Service'.
51. Figures from the summary of the 1938 Christmas operations by the Australian Postmaster General are at NAA, MP 273/1 1938/12525.
52. NAA, MP 391/5 2, H. Fysh, 'Report on Government Facilities', December 1938.
53. BAM, AW/1/2757, R. H. Mayo, 'Report on Replacement of the Fleet under the Empire Air Mail Scheme', 16 September 1939.
54. 'Christmas Mails 1938: Notes on the Operations' (note 45); for the engineering calamity that was the Armstrong Whitworth Ensign see O. Tapper, Armstrong Whitworth Aircraft since 1913 (London, 1973).
55. BAM, AW/1/2757, Mayo, 'Report on Replacement of the Fleet'.
56. NA, AVIA 2/1444, J. H. Riddoch, Department of Civil Aviation, to E. P. Bell, Postal Services Department, 26 October 1939.
57. The Cadman inquiry report is held at NA, CAB 21/2227 Part 1.
58. NA, AVIA 2/1276, see Minute 19b and A. R. Kidner, Postal Services Department, to the Secretary, Air Ministry, 15 June 1939.
59. NA, AVIA 2/1404, DOSI to DDGCA, 5 September 1938, Minute 27.
60. Ibid., DOCA to DOSI, Minute 34, 12 April 1939.
61. C. H. Barnes, Short's Aircraft since 1900 (London, 1989), pp. 341-4.
62. The first quote is from N. Barfield, 'The Age of the Flying Boat', in P. Jarrett (ed.), Biplane to Monoplane; Aircraft Development, 1919-1939 (London, 1997), p. 104,
63. and the second from R. Smith, 'The intercontinental airliner and the essence of airplane performance, 1929-1939', Technology and Culture 24, 3 (1983), 428-49, here p. 443.
64. See Edmonds, 'Australia, Britain and the Empire Air Mail Scheme', p. 104.