AVIATION POSTCARD CLUB INTERNATIONAL
NEWSLETTER #64 - SEPTEMBER 2008

WHAT DO YOU KNOW

One piece of follow up information to the Neville Stack story concerns his India flight partner Bernard Leete. His flying career in India ended when he lost his sight, or most of it, in a crash but he continued to work in civil aviation adminstration in India.

Here is a new puzzle card. At first sight I reckoned that it showed a Sopwith Gnu but although the cabin is very similar the struts are wrong. Close up it has French lettering F- underwing and ending AP on the fuselage – so F-??AP. The landscape has a northern France look to it and may be Le Bourget. Apart from the Gnu there were other cabin variants of radial or rotary biplanes, such as the Avro 504M, but this is not right either.. The tail does have the look of a Sopwith and it could be a conversion of a 1 ½ Strutter – for which the struts would be correct. The French built over 4000 of these, more than the British. But again, the inboard struts and some upper wing fairings seem to be different from the original Strutter. The best bet for an identification would be if anyone knows where a historic French register can be found to explore the possible fits to F-??AP.

And for comparison a Gnu ( Alpha series – 1920s) and 1 ½ Strutter ( Anon – possible Flight Magazine 1930s)



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