Cambuslang
CAMBUSLANG: Temporary aerodrome (Aka GREENLEESHILL FARM)
Location: W of the A749, 1.5nm S of Cambuslang town centre
A MICHAEL T HOLDER GALLERY
NOTES:
Although I did have the two visits by Cobham in CAMBUSLANG listed in the 'Guide', it was a pretty sparse entry to say the least. And I had no idea exactly where the venue was located. In late December 2020, Mike Holder who is a great friend of this 'Guide' decided to investigate and the maps etc above are the result. As he told me - it was far from being straightforward. Possibly the first understatement uttered in 2021?
The newspaper article above, published in the Motherwell Times on the 11th May 1934, gave Mike very valuable clues as to the location.
My original entry included this: "On the 5th May 1934 Alan Cobham’s UK Tour displayed in/near Cambuslang which today is on the outskirts of Glasgow roughly 5nm SE of the city centre. In 1935 on the 10th July Cobham’s No.2 Tour visited Cambuslang again and displayed according to their itinerary. Is the location for these venues known today?"
To which I should perhaps add that the 1934 Tour did not split into two Tours after the first couple of months, unlike the 1933 and 1935 Tours. In 1934 CAMBUSLANG was the 22nd venue, one of 159 venues to be visited that year. Or at least, this was how many were planned to be visited, and, incredibly it seems, most were!
Note: This article was published in the Motherwell Times on the 5th July 1935
In more recent years the Sir Alan Cobham 'Flying Circus' Tours in the first half of the 1930s have become to be a generic term. Rather like 'Hoover' for vacuum cleaners. His 'Tours' were without any doubt the biggest and best, but we need to remember that several others were involved at the time, and, the Cobham 'Tours' were not the first.
Indeed, the concept of touring displays was started just after WW1, in 1919, notably by the Berkshire Aviation Company from 1919 to 1922. In 1931 for example, Aviation Tours Ltd, (17 venues), C D Barnard Air Tours Ltd, (63 venues) and the North British Aviation Co Ltd, (13 venues), were staging 'Tours'.
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