Britain's Best

Asked who is the best British flyer the average U. S. newsreader would probably name Wing Commander Charles Kingsford-Smith. That notion was clubbed into the public mind by headlines far bigger and more numerous than any British airman has since received. It was deepened last year by publication in Liberty of a collection of testimonials by other famed airmen to Kingsford-Smith's prowess. Fortnight ago the foremost British aeronautical editor gave his definition of the foremost British flyer: Harold J. L. ("Bert") Hinkler--like Kingsford-Smith, an Australian. The editor: iconoclastic Charles Grey Grey of The Aeroplane,

In the U. S. small Pilot Hinkler (5 ft. 4 in.) is best remembered for his 15 1/2-day flight from England to Australia in 1928 (a record which stood for two years), although for years before that he had been doing astonishing things with light airplanes, among them the first non-stop flight from London to Turin in a 35 h. p. Baby Avro. For such exploits he was temporarily dubbed "Sir Jockey." Recently he was accorded casual notice for two remarkable solo flights, both in a light Puss Moth: New York to Kingston, Jamaica; and Natal, Brazil to Bathurst, British Gambia, West Africa--2.000 mi. (TIME, Dec. 7). The last flight, in Editor Grey's opinion, "beats anything that has ever been done singlehanded by any aviator in the world."

Even the English press failed to get excited about the first solo crossing of the South Atlantic. The reason, as seen by Editor Grey: "Bert Hinkler has a rooted prejudice against telling anybody that he is going to do anything before he does it. And that is not the way to become famous. . . . If you go and do a thing without telling the newspapers all about it beforehand, then, just out of spite, you get about four lines to say that it's been done."

For those who wonder why Pilot Hinkler suddenly popped out of his long obscurity to hop oceans, Editor Grey reveals a story: Few years ago Hinkler financed the building of a new small tandem-engined amphibian named the "Ibis," with funds made from his Australia flight. Unable to interest British capital he came to the U. S. in 1930. found capital even scarcer. Then a plan to make money, or attract backers, by a spectacular flight in a Lockheed fell through. Finally he drew from his small balance of life savings, bought the Puss Moth in Canada, got enough odd jobs in Toronto and New York to pay for the keep of himself and his plane. After long, secret tests he hopped for Jamaica to begin a desperate bid for enough fame to rehabilitate him commercially.

Besides Pilot Hinkler's evident ability as a distance flyer and navigator. Editor Grey portrays him as a smart inventor but a poor businessman; an extraordinary testpilot but utterly lacking in tact-- "quite capable of going to a managing director and telling him that if he really wants to make money out of aeroplanes the best thing he can do is pension off his chief designer just for the sake of keeping him away from the Design Office."

Pilot Hinkler's tactlessness alone would be almost enough to endear him to Editor Grey who loves nothing more than to bait the Air Ministry and infuriate the Industry, with which he occasionally enjoys keen unpopularity. Intensely patriotic (suspected of Francophobia), a firm believer in British aviation, he loathes dunderheadedness in business and government, constantly spanks where he thinks it will do most good, not sparing his advertisers.

Tall, lean, 56, Editor Grey walks with a limp, the result of a hip fracture, wears a monocle. He used to tear about in a Talbot car at furious speeds. He established The Aeroplane 20 years ago with the help of Sir Ellice Victor Sassoon, three years after covering his first aviation story as correspondent for The Autocar. He never learned to fly, and for long refused to go as a passenger because it was difficult to accept one invitation without accepting all--a practice which would probably prove fatal.

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