I am deeply appreciative of the great honour you have bestowed upon me in asking me to address you tonight. When Louis Bleriot made his memorable flight I was a boy of six and, I am sorry to say, not yet at school. In fact, I had to wait until I was nine to see my first aeroplane which, believe it or not, was a Bleriot monoplane fitted with a Gnome engine and flown by another pioneer aviator, B. C. Hucks.

The simplicity of the aircraft and the apparent ease of flight made a deep impression on my boyish imagination. So much so that the same imagination was quite affronted when it first saw the pusher biplanes with which we prepared to fight the First World War. Having had nothing to do with it, I can now claim it took a further 25 years for the advancing march of aviation finally to confirm my childish fancy!