REACHING NEW HEIGHTS
Air travel has come a long way since the magic and mayhem of its early days, as a new book charting the history of flight emphasises
A book looks back at the early days of air travel
Slow, noisy, dusty, bumpy and very, very dangerous. The early days of commercial air travel were anything but comfortable. In 1938, on the fledgling Imperial Airways, it took four long days in a Short Empire flying boat from Southampton to South Africa, with 24 stops en route in France, Italy, Greece, Egypt, Sudan, Uganda, Kenya, Tanganyika and Portuguese East Africa (see picture, page 67). Passengers had to endure airsickness, technical failures, empty fuel tanks and even crash landings. Fatal accidents occurred with startling regularity. In its 15 years of operation, Imperial Airways suffered 20 of them, including two ditchings in the English Channel, a sinking off the coast of northern Italy, a collision with a radio mast in Flanders and a crash in Belgium following an in-flight fire. The latter is thought to be the first ever case of aeroplane sabotage in the air.
The trials and tribulations of early air travel are the subject of a new illustrated book, Taking to the Air. The author, Lily Ford, pinpoints the catalysts that spurred us upwards: the first nonstop flight across the Atlantic by Captains Alcock and Brown in a Vickers Vimy bomber; the British government’s flogging of excess First World War RAF aircraft, for “£5 a plane at Hendon, cheaper by half than the mechanic’s charge for its certificate of airworthiness”; and the solo transatlantic crossing from New York to Paris by Charles Lindbergh, who “for a few months… became the most famous man in the world”.
“This was enormous in terms of drawing a line under the negative associations with flight that had hung over from the First World War,” Ford says of Lindbergh’s achievement, “and thinking more about the positive, forward-looking embrace of technology.”
What really turned the public on to the idea of passenger flight, though, were the so-called joyrides – short, cheap novelty flights that allowed paying customers to experience flying for the first time. Former RAF pilots would tour Britain, thrilling spectators with stunt flying before offering locals the chance to view their home towns from the air. Around 50,000 people a year paid up to £1 (£47 in today’s money) for the experience. “Quite remarkably, no members of the public were killed,” Ford says.
Unsurprisingly, the fear of death was a major stumbling block during those early days of passenger flight. Having witnessed German Zeppelin bombing raids and pilots dropping like flies during the Great War, the general public found it hard to separate the ideas of flying and dying. Canny marketing came to the rescue. Ford explains how female passengers were key in this battle of hearts and minds.
“If a woman was not afraid to fly, a man would not be either. If a delicate lady could sew, write in her diary, put lipstick on and not get sick while flying, then a slightly less delicate man could certainly enjoy the flight,” she says.
Outside of the advertising messages, however, nearly all passengers were male – civil servants of the British Empire, or wealthy businessmen. And the reality of those early services was much grimmer than the brochures suggested.
“The converted DH34 biplanes used in the 1920s were fitted out with eight wicker chairs, the only concession to cosiness being a measure of chintz upholstery,” Ford writes. “On some Continental airlines passengers were given earplugs. Fatalities were
‘The converted DH34 biplanes used in the 1920s were fitted out with eight wicker chairs’
high, and insurers initially refused to cover passengers who chose to fly.”
According to Ford, the first regular passenger service was all the way back in 1919 – a short hop across Tampa Bay between the Florida cities of St Petersburg and Tampa. In the early 1920s, you could fly from London to Paris. By 1929, following the launch of Imperial Airways in 1924, passengers were fanning out across the British Empire, the numbers growing rapidly until, by the late 1930s, there were about 50,000 a year taking to the skies.
During this era, newspapers, magazines and the cinema were filled with glamorous stories and exciting footage of international flight. The fictional pilot Biggles, whose first novel by Capt W E Johns appeared in 1932, was a key figure in romanticising flight, as was Sir Alan Cobham, whose touring air shows and joyrides had attracted three million spectators and almost a million paying passengers by the end of the 1930s. At around the same time, the British government was funding new flying clubs and subsidising the cost of lessons.
Even so, it wasn’t until well after the Second World War that international air travel became a truly commercial form of transport. “Aviation now exerted a powerful pull on the popular imagination,” Ford explains, “drawing on a mixture of Blitz-forged resilience, the prevailing plucky underdog narrative of the Battle of Britain and confidence in a new jet-powered future.”
Throughout the 1950s, the British state airline BOAC offered passenger jet services in Africa, Asia and across the Atlantic. Footage of the Royal Family and various stars of film and music on board added to the appeal of this new jet set.
In the 1960s and 1970s, air travel opened up to the masses as charter flights were integrated into package holidays, and jumbo jets reduced ticket prices. Ford says that between 1968 and 1978 world passenger numbers increased sixfold. “Flight was being reconceptualised as an aspirational part of modern life,” Ford says.
Forty years on, with international flight now dominated by budget airlines, it’s difficult to imagine the magic and charm of that jet age. “Although the likes of Easyjet and Ryanair have helped us to become global citizens, they are no frills,” she admits. “Flying has become humdrum.” Still, there’s a promise of more glamour beyond the horizon, she says. “That’s in space tourism.”