To go back to the original question:-

Montgolfier balloon,

Stringfellow’s steam-powered aeroplane (ok this was a scale,unmanned model which flew,albeit inside his factory)-arguably the first powered heavier-than- air aeroplane to fly,

Then the Wright flyer (arguably the first manned HTA powered aeroplane),

Vickers Vimy- trans-Atlantic flyer,

Sikorsky VS-300 1st helicopter,

Heinkel 176, Gloster Whittle,

Bell X-1,

X-15,

TU 144 & Concorde

& Rockwell SST-1 Columbia.

Looks as if things are begining to move at Coltishall.
EDP24

Edited: Please don’t ‘quote’ an entire lengthy chunk from a post immediately above – Moggy

Nice to see that some communitee spirit survives in this country.:D 😀

In case it takes Pondskater a while to dig out his photos, here are some taken at Doncaster in 1976. Pity that tower/prewar terminal was not preserved.

Incidentally, I knew a pilot who had flown Dakotas from Doncaster during the war, when he was with 271 Squadron – and those of you who are local might be interested in his low vis approach. Locate the A1 and fly north at low level until passing the Punches Hotel (lights always visible), count so many seconds, turn left 90 descend and flare after another prescribed number of seconds. Well it worked.

Thanks for the photo’s- this is the sort of thing we need at Aeroventure to build the historical picture of the airfeild- please PM me & let me know if you are willing to let us use some of them for our displays.

Many thanks Rad

Hi folks

Does anyone have any idea what this area is at wattisham;
http://www.flashearth.com/?lat=52.132259&lon=0.951827&z=18.2&r=0&src=msl
Looks like it was built on some old dispersals and must be post war.

Richard

I was based at Wattisham 1989-1990 & if memory serves me right it had somthing to do with communications at the time- but don’t quote me on it.

Would anyone have an idea on the value of the following,

Framed signed photo of Guy Gibson inc Wings & photo of his dog “Ni**er”.

Douglas Bader signed colour newspaper cutting and dated 12/01/1979.

There are also letters from Johny Johnson, Stanford Tuck.

Also the attached scan which I cannot read the signiture.

Signed 1943 Church Fenton Xmas menu.

There is also a framed pencil drawing of a unkown pilot.

The above are all original and have provenance.

Many thanks will be able to provide more detailed info next weekend

Your best level of enquiry is to go through a specialised auction or sale company to find the values- these may help but bear in mind prices fluctuate regularly due to demand or scarcity.

Having examined the attached photo it appears to be signed “best of luck Joe Soloman”.

By the way If the Douglas Bader/Johnnie Johnson pieces reflect thier time with 616 Squadron please may I have facsimile copies ( for museum display)- PM me & let me know.

Cheers Rad.

As a member of the SYAM/Aeroventure & have been for about 25 years, I feel I should reply to what appears to be a comment suggesting that the museum has a “magpie” collection policy.

I can assure you that is not the case. I am not going into great detail giving examples of what the museum has exchanged & farmed out over the years, as I feel this is not neccessary with comments made by other forum members on this thread.

What I will say is this, I joined this Forum both for my own enjoyment & to enable me to get occasional feedback (both good & bad) from forum members in order to enable us to continue to improve the museum for the benefit of visitors. After all we are a registered eductional charity- i.e. we aim to educate & inspire!

We do take advice on board & thank you for the comments received, so far the greater %age has been favourable- without them we run the risk of stagnating the displays & turning visitors away.

Yes we are a large concern, & yes, we do have a degree of duplication in airframes- for many reasons i.e. spares recovery, museum members private ownership, display rotation e.t.c.

Also we are not perfect, we don,t get things right every time, but we do aim to run things as professionally as possible.

As for the comment made by Grim Reaper, may I suggest he gives a brief explaination as to the context of his comment made on this thread.