Originally Posted by
Warmtoast
Highly polished RAF aircraft for VIPs to travel in seemed to be the norm in those days as I witnessed at RAF Benson on Saturday 29th August 1959 when President Eisenhower who was on a visit to the UK for talks with prime minister Harold Macmillan flew up to Scotland to see the Queen and rather than flying in Air Force One (or whatever it was called in those days), he was flown to Aberdeen and back by an RAF Comet of 216 Sqn. seen here as it arrived at Benson on return from Aberdeen.
According to Wiki, AF1 in 1959 was a Connie, so it was a case on one-upmanship. 707s didn't enter the fleet until the early '60s apparently and in any case might have been a bit 'marginal' on Aberdeen's 6,000ft runway.(Still RAF Dyce in those days wasn't it?)