Claude Grahame-White

Before airplanes were an everyday reality, he was one of the people showing the public what flight could be. Born in Hampshire in 1879, he trained as a pilot in the years just after Louis Blériot’s Channel crossing and quickly became a leading figure in British aviation.

He is especially remembered for making the first night flight during the 1910 London-to-Manchester air race, a bold moment that helped make him famous. He also played a major part in establishing Hendon as a center of early British flying and later worked in aircraft production and aerial business ventures.

He died in 1959 in Nice, France. His career belongs to the dramatic, experimental age of early flight, when aviators were still proving that airplanes could be practical, exciting, and world-changing.