COMBAT AND COMPETITION.pdf - Lakes Gliding Club

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
So many people have helped with this book that it is impossible to name them
all. But my special thanks are due to Mrs Rosemary Bromley who has guided
me unerringly since the first tentative efforts appeared on paper. To Air Vice
Marshal Sandy Hunter who has supported and encouraged me throughout the
whole project. To Chris Thomas, Typhoon historian par excellence, who steered
me through the intricacies of the Public Records Office. To Brigadier Timbers,
Secretary of the Royal Artillery Historical Trust, who corrected erroneous
memories about the 27th (Army) Field Regiment in 1941. To Sebastian Cox of
the Air Historical Branch, the staff of the reference library at the RAF Museum
and John May A.R.P.S. who worked wonders with a set of elderly dogeared
photographs.
To my old Typhoon colleagues and good friends Jimmy Simpson, Arthur
Todd, 'Killy' Kilpatrick, Ronnie Sheward and Pinkie Stark I am particularly
grateful - together with those of 197 Squadron, especially Allan Smith, Derek
Lovell, Geoff Hartley, Bob Gibbings, Roy Allan, and the late Bruce Gilbert.
Their reminiscences and those of Ben Gunn, last chief test pilot of Boulton Paul
Aircraft, have helped to fill many an important gap in the sequence of events.
The gliding story owes as much again to the memories of Harry Midwood and
Wally Kahn, spanning between them a period of over four decades.
My gratitude to Ron Howard too, who recently retired as Chairman of GEC
Avionics, for his invaluable contribution to the chapters about the aircraft
industry.
Without my wife Anne the whole thing would have been quite impossible.
She, it was who insisted that I learned to use a word processor, who put up with
the endless disruption to meals and family life, and corrected the manuscript
again and again.
Last, and not least, my thanks to Tony Roberts of Newton Publishers without
whose assistance it might never have seen the light of day.
VIII