David George sold the 12E operations of Sloane Helicopters to Central Helicopters. I was in Argyll spreading phosphates on the forests at the time and I remember getting some instructions to change the name on the van. For whatever reason I only got around to doing one side and it was a point of great jocularity with the locals that we were 2-faced
I free-lanced for Central or a short time - Jim Koty was a field engineer they sent up. Then I went to work for BEAS for a season's crop spraying in Lincs followed by more forestry. Phil Slattery was the field engineer for a while and he introduced me to StarWars when it first came out - so that pins the year to 1977. Geoff Kitto was over from Nelson NZ doubling his crop-spraying seasons around that time. Gordon Neals outfit were a pleasure to work with. Bob Towsland(?) was the rep for the local area and did a fine job. I even got to like the "Boston Stamp Collection" managed by Pat It was quite a challenge to get into some of those tiny fields and squirt the roses. I read somewhere that G-BDRY was wrecked. That had been the aircraft they had kept for my use. What happened in the end? Where did John Neal go? They had some great footage on home movies of Dave Bond spraying with a hang-stick Hiller 12A and Paul Midgley in a Djinn.