Luton in the Fifties. Grass track runway.
 

I see there was a discussion about airfields near Watford back in 2006 and I wasn't registered with this forum then otherwise I'd have joined in but I see that Luton was mentioned a few times and I wondered if anyone is interested in my memories of the place.

When I was just 7 yrs old in 1953 my father an ex RAF Bomber Command Pilot who flew Wellingtons in WWII was working for Smiths Aircraft Instruments and he took my brother and me over to Luton for a pleasure flight around the area doing a few circuits of Luton.
Smiths had a Percival Proctor there G-AHFK which later won a few Air Race Trophies and ended its days in South Africa. After Smiths sold the Proctor they acquired a Saab Safir G-ANOK and we also had a flight or two in that.

The Luton aerodrome was very crude affair compared to the complex that is there today. We had to drive almost through the middle of Vauxhall's factory to get there and there was a very modern control tower and it was manned by a guy who lived in a bungalow right by the entrance gate called Mr Rushton.

At the age of 7 I hated flying as I couldn't see out of the window and the massive amount of bumping in flight was like being blindfolded and sent on a roller coaster. The noise was horrendous and I was not a fan of flying from that moment on. But I did go plane spotting by cycling on my bicycle to Bovingdon from our home in Watford and I would have been about 11 or 12 at the time. We used to watch American planes at Bovingdon and I seem to remember the Blackburn Beverly or possibly the Fairchild Packet.

At one point my father landed the Saab at somewhere like Bovingdon and parked it up just below the wing of the huge Blackburn plane making it look quite funny by comparison that the press photographed it.
I remember my father showing me the press proofs of the photos.

At Luton on one unfortunate occasion my father let a partly trained pilot bring the Saab into Luton to land. Something went a bit wrong on touchdown and the nosewheel snapped off and the plane nose dived into the grass when almost stopped. This did a fair bit of damage and snapped off the prop.

I remember taking the yellow and black tip of the prop that my dad brought home after this incident. Nobody was hurt but it was a great boost to my ego to take the prop tip to school and show it off.

It is indeed sad to think that Bovingdon has become just a Car Boot sale site and a store for something and has no connection now with the Aircraft industry or military. I did have an email from a Canadian guy who was at Bovingdon during the Cold War and he had a very nostalgic soft spot for the place.

I wonder if anyone else reading this forum has any memories of Luton.

Saab Safir G-ANOK was eventually sold to a private owner who flew many trips from Scotland to Sweden and back. It was eventually sent to the East Fortune Museum and somehow it left there and found its way into a barn in a farm on the Scottish Borders where it still remains to this day. It is in what is best described as a sorry state now. The present owner doesn't wish to make contact about it and one can probably assume it will never fly again. Restoration would probably be too expensive and not guaranteed to be made airworthy again. It was a very advanced plane for its time.

I would be happy to hear from anyone in email or on the forum if they have any parallel memories of that time and place.
--
Plado (New member now in S Devon)

You are a bit older than myself Plado but I do recall logging G-ANOK at Turnhouse on a spotting trip, although I don't have an exact date - I think in the 60's would that have been possible?
I remember my first trip to Luton in 1968 and how helpful the staff were to myself and a friend. We were allowed to go into the hangars but told to not
touch anything and to stay away from the busy apron. :ok:

Its the same today for we "back office" staff. :)

Plado. Welcome to the forum, and a little memory for you, not at Luton but Turnhouse photo courtesy of Colin Lourie.

Keith.

http://i261.photobucket.com/albums/i.../ganokturn.jpg

Visit to Airline Engineering
 

Sorry but my first visit to Luton came in August 1966 and then only briefly as I still lived in the North of England. After moving to Bedford later in the year my visits became more frequent and one of the most enjoyable was a visit to Airline Engineering in July of 1968. Monarch only had two Britannias then G-AOVH and G-AOVI and after I had written to Monarch (I still have the invitation) to have a look round and they told me to come on a weekday as both Brits would be busy at the weekend naturally. I turned up and was invited to look round the hangar and a Britannia (unfortunately cannot remember which one) which was having its seats taken out for a charter to Khartoum in the Sudan for British American Tobacco carrying cigarettes. The day was a Tuesday and it would be back in time for passenger service for the weekend. There was not much on the ramp as I recall - a couple of Britannia Britannias and not much else.
Looking further ahead does anyone remember the regular Condor B727 flights in the 1970s?

Thank you muchly for that superb photo of G-ANOK
I've never seen that picture before. Where is Turnhouse exactly?

It's a very early 1960s looking photo.
My memory of G-ANOK seems to place the colour as pale primrose yellow with a black stripe but I could be mixing that up with my father's Triumph Vitesse which was pale yellow with a very dark green stripe down the side.
However, I feel pretty sure she was pale yellow at any rate.

The amount of space in the cockpit was amazing and it was a 4 seater or 2+2 and it seemed to me a very much smoother machine than the Proctor. I learned in recent times that the Proctor was a flawed design and a few of them crashed with air-frame failures. So it looks like I might have been up in a bit of a death trap in 1954! Oh well I lived to tell the tale and nobody crashed G-AHFK as far as I know.

Thanks very much for that photo it was a very nice touch. I will cherish that one. It's so good, I think I might even frame a copy to keep at home.

With best wishes
Plado (Laurie Prior)

Turnhouse is the 'old' name of what is now called Edinburgh EDI EGPH

Think we should reinstate these good old names........

Woolsington, Yeadon, Ringway etc etc etc...

the list goes on and on and on.......

...like John Lennon, George Best?

Nah, best stick to place names.

Hi, Please note the name of this Forum..."Aviation History and Nostalgia".

Castle Donington, Lulsgate, Rhoose etc. are place names.

Not like the namby pamby George Best, John Lennon which I agree are naff for names as locations......:ugh:

The 'Oldies' fight back.......:D

Not quite the same vintage as 'Plado', my first visit to Luton was in April 1965. The old-old terminal (just off what is now taxiway echo) looked out over two grass runways (06/24 and 18/36) towards the main 08/26 runway. Constellations (Euravia, Brit Air, Skyways), Vikings and Ambassadors were being replaced with Britannias and HS748s. Jets followed in 1968.
Luton Flying Club operated three Austers, and was re-equipping with Cessna 150s. On my first visit in April 1965, I 'logged' about 30 aircraft.

The thought of large turbo-propped aircraft using Luton back then is one that almost seems unbelievable. I imagine that after around 1960 the grass runways were upgraded to something a little more compatible with civilian passenger planes as the grass runways of the 50s was only really suitable for small craft and TigerMoths!

I never visited there after about 1961 and I remember my Dad filling up his Hillman Minx with very high octane petrol, the cheap stuff on tap from the pump outside the hangar door! Those were the days of "pinking" and regular decokes. You never hear of grinding valves in today, or new piston rings. When we filled up with petrol at Car Petrol stations my father would ask for "A shot of upper cylinder" which was I think RedEx upper cylinder lubricant. Oh those days of "cooking grade" petrol at 4/2d a gallon. We'll never see fun like that again. It was nice to be here for the best bit though.

And the phonetic alphabet left over from the RAF days George Able Nan Oboe King, and George Able How Fox King, nothing like the police phonetics of today
Golf Alpha November Oscar Kilo. Almost completely different.
--
Plado

Luton
 

Hi Plado,

My first visit to Luton was around 1956 - and bingo - there was the Proctor HFK.

http://i966.photobucket.com/albums/a...NC1956185.jpg?

There was also the local airline and the scrap behind the hangar. I will try and put these up on separate posts, as I cannot get two more full size photos on this one (limited skills).

What a cracking shot of the Safir at Turnhouse!! :ok:

My first memories of Luton date from August 1958 when I was doing my PPL at Marshalls, Cambridge. I was sent off on a solo cross-country via Luton and White Waltham back to Cambridge in Tiger Moth G-ALTW. No particular problems with the grass, and no need to use the newish control tower, as I had no radio anyway. Also a bit of time to look around. A few gems were the Scorpion-powered Canberra WK163, the silver fuselage of Rapide G-AFOI in a hangar, 2 other Rapides IBB and LBC, Jet Provost OBU, Lockheed 12A GTL, as well as some more "ordinary" stuff such as Apache PLJ (quite new at the time), the red Chipmunk PAC, the dark green Gemini KEK, red Tiger Moth OGS ("Miss 'Obbs"), and the Pegasus Viking HOY.
An excellent flight and a great day out. A hard day though, with 7 flights and about 6 hours logged.
Tomorrow I fly, as I often do, by easyJet from Geneva to LTN. It is very different these days!

Laurence

Luton Airways!!
 

Rapide IBB - Like the prototype airstairs -


http://i966.photobucket.com/albums/a...19571136-1.jpg


Still can't get a normal sized image from this one - it says 'Luton Airways' on the nose! :ok:

http://img404.imageshack.us/img404/7960/getimage10.jpg

By Luton's "new" tower

G-AIBB
 

Yes, G-AIBB was one of the Rapides I saw in 1958, and it was marked "Luton Airways", and the "new" tower was there.

Laurence

Very much so, I must have some photos somewhere, about the time my dad was a regular at the flying club. If I wasn't up with him I was wandering around the grass areas without any hassle, as long as 18/36 wasn't in use.

Dated 1970
http://img580.imageshack.us/img580/862/layoutxe.jpg

Luton's first tower can be seen on the right