GB 1910 Cover - London to Manchester Air Race

Stock Code: P189004490

1910 London to Manchester Air Race. Flown ½d postcard addressed to Worthing and cancelled by a London machine cancel for MY.18.1910. Endorsed on reverse in bold ink "London to Manchester flight/C Grahame White/April 1910.
In 1906 the Daily Mail offered a £10,000 prize for the first aviator to fly from London to Manchester in 24 hours, a seemingly impossible task at the time when the furthest anyone in Europe had flown was a mere 200m. By 1910 things had changed and the first pilot to attempt the flight was Claude Grahame-White, his first attempt on 23rd April failed due to bad weather and engine problems. The plane was further damaged when it overturned in high winds whilst on the ground.
Returning to London for repairs, his second attempt on the 27th had the added complication of being against the pioneering French aviator Louis Paulhan. Paulhan got the jump on Grahame-White and despite heroically making the first UK night flight in an attempt to catch up, it was not to be. Engine troubles again forced him to land and Paulhan took the prize.
Card folded in half, no doubt from being carried in his jacket pocket nevertheless an important item and a superb piece of aviation history. Offered with a second contemporary photographic PPC of his overturned Farman III aeroplane, autographed in blue ink at top.

$2,614.71*

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GB 1910 Cover - London to Manchester Air Race - $2,614.71*


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