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The Formative Years of the British Aircraft Industry, 1913–1924

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 June 2012

Peter Fearon
Peter Fearon
Affiliation:
Lecturer in Economic History, University of Leicester
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Abstract

Although early British aircraft manufacturers attempted to exploit the private, civil aviation, and export markets for their products, the military market became the most important one by World War I. Mr. Fearon shows that the aircraft industry was largely dependent on military orders, but that government policy in this area tended to retard rather than promote progress and growth. It was only the optimism of the pioneer firms about the future which made the expansion of the industry possible.

Type
Research Article
Information
Business History Review , Volume 43 , Issue 4 , Winter 1969 , pp. 476 - 495
Copyright
Copyright © The President and Fellows of Harvard College 1969

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References

1 I should like to thank Dr. D. H. Aldcroft for his many helpful comments on this paper and the University of Leicester Research Board for a grant toward expenses.

2 See the Government survey on the private ownership of aeroplanes P.R.O. Cab. 14, Appendix, Air Committee: Minutes, Memoranda etc., 1912–1914.

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53 A trade association founded in 1916.

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73 It is important to bear in mind that expenditure on active service squadrons was in 1922 only 21 per cent of total expenditure. The estimates of 1922–23 provided for 92 new machines, 65 machines to be converted, 361 machines to be reconditioned by contractors, and 184 machines to be reconditioned in repair depots. Even these meager orders were felt to be excessive by the Geddes “Axe” Committee. First Interim Report of the Committee on National Expenditure, Cmd. 1581 (1922), 87, 92, 99.

74 London Times, March 22, 1922. Other articles appeared on March 21, 23, 24, 25 and 27.

75 Napiers were to regret the lack of competition in the aero engine industry in the 1920's, which left the company with no compulsion to pursue an intensive development policy. C. H. Wilson and W. J. Reader, Men and Machines, 119–120.

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