Book Reviews

Book Reviews

Air Travel in the Golden Age

By C Woodley

The History Press, The Mill, Brimscombe Port, Stroud, Gloucestershire GL5 2QG, UK. 2018. 197pp. Illustrated. £17.99. ISBN 978-0-75097014-3.

Short S.30 Empire Flying Boat, G-AFCV, Caribou. RAeS (NAL).

It is now some 80 years since Imperial Airways operated routes by Short C Class flying boats out of Southampton Water to the Empire and there will be few left alive today who can say that they experienced the luxury and service of these flights; we are literally speaking of a bygone age.

In his charming book describing ‘Air Travel in the Golden Age’, Charles Woodley has done a creditable job describing what it was like to fly as a passenger in these wonderful ‘boats which flew’ in which he has made good use of the archive material available, at least for the British flying boat era.

During the 1920s and 1930s of the past century, in terms of luxury a fair comparison could be made between air travel and that by sea, the former being simply a quicker mode of transport; both were used largely by government officials and by those with both the time and wealth to travel in this way.

Air travel expanded fairly rapidly after WW1 but only for relatively short journeys; airliners had low capacity and were constrained by the fact that there were few airports with facilities such as radio aids and proper runways of sufficient length for heavyweight take offs and landings. In contrast, most countries had sufficient coastlines with ports and infrastructure already in place. The Mediterranean countries were ideally situated in this way (Italy, in particular) and in developing the Empire routes to India and Africa it was a logical decision for Imperial Airways to operate flying boats from Brindisi to Alexandria before and after which land-based aircraft would provide the transport.

Berths on Short S.23 Canopus. RAeS (NAL).

However, the real catalyst to technical progress was probably the Empire Air Mail Scheme in which, from 1937, Imperial Airways would receive a subsidy to carry nearly all the mail to South Africa, India and Australasia at the same rate as surface mail which meant that frequencies and reliability would have to be improved. So it was with these two criteria in mind the airline approached Short Bros to submit a design which would not only carry the quantities of mail envisaged but also a reasonable load of passengers. The Short S.23 was the result in 1935, to be followed in due course by the S.30, the first two of a long line of derivations of the Short flying boats to fly the routes to the Empire.

The Short S.23 and S.30 are described in some detail, particularly in relation to the furnishings and, for passengers, it was clearly a wonderful experience. The procedure for passengers leaving the UK was that on the night before the flight they would travel down from London to Southampton by train (Pullman, of course) for a departure to Marseilles and Rome early the following morning. Many of the passengers kept diaries of their journeys or wrote letters describing the flights and service on board and the author makes good use of these.

In subsequent chapters the operations of these Short flying boats flown by Qantas and Tasman Empire Airways Limited (TEAL) are described in a similar way and it comes as a pleasant surprise to read that these operations carried on well into the 1950s and even the early 1970s with Ansett and RAI out of French Polynesia. Nearer home, Aquila Airways – the last airline in the UK to use flying boats exclusively – receives an honourable chapter and in a little more depth than some other airlines.

The author then goes on to describe the activities of other airlines of which Pan American was the most adventurous and, dare I say it, more innovative with their Sikorsky S-42, Martin M-130  and ultimately the Boeing 314. Pan American played in an entirely different garden to Imperial Airways and, under Juan Trippe, the airline built up an excellent network along both coastlines of South America with the S-42 and the subsequent expansion across the Pacific Ocean during the latter 1930s was determined and extraordinary. I feel that the activities of Ralph O’Neill could have received a mention here.

Her account begins with the path taken by Douglas from a relatively modest background, like so many early constructors on both sides of the Atlantic. In 1912 after being one of the first aeronautical engineering students at the upstart Massachusetts Institute of Technology, he took on short-term posts with the Connecticut and Glenn Martin aircraft companies until, during WW1, he became chief civilian aeronautical engineer with the US Signal Corp’s aviation section. At its end he returned to Glenn Martin where he worked on designing a twin-engined heavy bomber that he believed could be adapted for the potentially vast commercial market.

Dr George Hislop (left), RAeS President 1973-1974, presenting Donald Wills Douglas Sr (1892-1981) with his RAeS Honorary Fellowship in February 1974. RAeS (NAL).

In her easy style Filucci tells us about Douglas’s dream of “giving life to something that has a profound impact on the life of all mankind” that could only be achieved through starting his own firm. He decided to base it in the favourable climate of Southern California into which he sank his young wife’s and his own total savings of $26,000 and where he would soon be joined by many of his previous most able work colleagues.

From 1920 onwards the fledgling company would make startling progress by supplying aircraft to the US military through which it earned such high-profit margins that the Depression of 1929 did not affect it. The next leap forward came when, in 1932, it obtained an option from Trans-Continental and Western Airline (the forerunner to TWA) to build a total of 60 twin-engined commercial passenger aeroplanes with advanced design features. These had the designation DC-1 (Douglas Commercial One) with the DC-2 following and the process culminating in the famed DC-3 (Dakota) that came to symbolise the superiority of American aviation. Thoroughgoing scientific tests conducted by Douglas on the aircraft enabled it to achieve the required level of reliability and strength for a passenger aircraft designed to transport cargo and passengers across remote areas. The peak of success came when, during WW2, the Dakota subsequently became the US military’s legendary workhorse, with more than 10,000 produced (Its only contemporary rival for the title of the most famous transport aircraft of all time was the German Junkers Ju52 which required servicing after every 500 hours flight compared to the DC-3’s 1,500 hours).

For a biographer, recounting success is arguably not that difficult but when she describes a man who follows a remarkably set regime of life, we sense that some trouble is overdue. She tells us how he famously always ate breakfast of one egg, one piece of white toast and one cup of black coffee, how he left for his factory at 9, worked in his walnut-panelled office until 12 noon, when he had his habitual lunch before returning home at 5.30 where dinner was always taken at 6.30 and always included a chocolate sundae, and how he passed every evening alone in his library while his wife listened to the radio elsewhere with his relaxation coming with time spent every weekend on his yacht.

After WW2 things did became far more complicated and Filucci recounts how Douglas suffered a series of setbacks. With flexibility not Douglas’s strong suit, his unyielding standards of construction practice combined with marked financial conservatism led him to miss significant business opportunities while his unswerving filial loyalty to a son lacking his calibre, brought inevitable crises.

The picture becomes steadily adverse during the 1950s and early 1960s as events moved against Douglas when he rejected supersonic jet transport in favour of pushing into space. Despite producing weapons like the Honest John surface-to-surface missile, the Thor ICBM and the Skybolt ballistic missile, frenetic competition with the Soviets brought unexpected and repeated cancellations. The problems of allocating resources between aeroplanes and missiles also led the company to be outmanoeuvred by rival constructor Boeing whose 707, 727 and 737 aircraft  models overtook Douglas’s DC-8s and DC-9s in both sales and delivery times resulting in the company eventually becoming bankrupt and being taken over by James McDonnell.