A TREE consultant from Stoke Row is helping to commemorate a pioneering female pilot by donating special timber to a reconstruction of her plane.
Hugo Loudon, managing director of Heritage Tree Services, has worked with the Hangar 42 Spitfire Museum in Blackpool on an exhibition about Amy Johnson, who was the first woman to fly solo from London to Australia.
The museum is reconstructing the Airspeed Oxford, the machine in which Johnson died in 1941 after taking off from RAF Squire’s Gate, which is now Blackpool Airport.
There will also be a permanent memorial to all RAF and Commonwealth crews who flew this type of plane during the Second World War.
Johnson, who was born in Yorkshire and lived briefly in Hurley, was introduced to flying as a hobby while working as a secretary in London.
Under the tutelage of Captain Valentine Baker, she became the first British woman to obtain a ground engineer’s “C” licence.
She married Scottish pilot Jim Mollison and the pair went on to set many flying records.
But in January 1941, Johnson died when she flew off course in bad weather and crashed into the Thames Estuary near Herne Bay in Kent.
Mr Loudon wanted to get involved in the project as he was interested in Second World War aircraft and their pilots as well as the achievements of women.
He said: “I’m building a museum dedicated to the Second World War and the air crews that were lost, which totalled more than 47,000 young people. It was not only them but their mothers, sisters, brothers, fathers and friends.
“It had an impact on me that I wasn’t really able to reconcile so I decided to start building a museum in their honour, which then quickly mushroomed into sourcing aeroplane wreckage from Russia, Holland, Germany, Belgium, Hungary and the USA.
“Our focus was the pilots and engineering and had no real political elements, just a sort of humanist approach to it.
“The other purpose of the museum is to hand the baton of remembrance to the younger generation that might be slightly far removed through time from understanding that our freedom of security against tyranny was given to us by, among others, the air crews.
“The Second World War saw an incredible advance in aviation engineering as everyone was trying to build faster and more powerful planes for their various pursuits of invasion or defence.
“In my collecting, I met a curator of a museum called Eric Wallace, who runs the Hangar 42 Spitfire Museum. Upon doing a deal on an engine, I became aware of the Saving Amy project.
“There are so many ways to look at Amy Johnson — her achievements and how she empowers women to be able to achieve their dreams. I like that bit a lot.
“Her achievements are remarkable in a world where she probably would have had quite a lot of hurdles to overcome.
“She had the passion and determination to be a very brilliant professional but also to dazzle the world with such extraordinary achievement.
“Apart from the fascination I had with her bravery, expertise and achievement, I was particularly enthralled by the fact that there have been many benefactors and the recognition that women can achieve their dreams and pursue any profession that they choose. It’s important that we all support that to provide a more balanced community, country and world.
“Here at Heritage Tree Services, we have a number of very talented women working as tree fellers and climbers as well as consulting and working as technicians in the office.
“On that basis, I felt it would be worth promoting the Saving Amy project.
“If women are able to find things that they want to do and become brilliant, successful and professional at it, this has to be something we should all encourage.”
His tree workers came across the wood for the replica plane by chance.
Mr Loudon said: “In our capacity as arboricultural contractors and consultants, the Hangar 42 museum needed some very special timber for parts of the aeroplane.
“It took me a year to find the correct tree and then we needed to do some complex milling to get the specification correct.
“They needed a certain type of timber, Norwegian Spruce, and a client of ours in Hurley, which by coincidence is where Amy used to live, was very kind in donating four trees to us.
“Then Benson Sawmills, with whom we have a long affiliation, cut it to our specification and we sent it to Blackpool.
“The wood has got to be dried carefully for a year and carefully stored.
“We replaced the four trees with native Scots pines, which are more appropriate in their current setting.
“The team building the plane is fantastic and the cause is fabulous. I think the message is something that we should all take on board.”
Mr Loudon’s museum collection is currently in Checkendon, near the company’s offices in Stoke Row, and will be open to visitors by appointment.
He said: “It’s currently a quite small collection but it will be a trailer for a bigger exhibition, which we hope to take somewhere perhaps in Oxfordshire.
“Some of the aeroplane parts that we find around the world are sold and used in the restoration of vintage aviation.
“We’re designing lights and sculptures from crashed parts to help pay the rent and some of the costs.”
Mr Loudon said aviation restoration and tree services went well together.
He said: “Within Heritage Tree Services, we move trees, so we do a lot of engineering and modifications to all sorts of equipment.
“It’s quite easy to start looking at how we dismantle and reassemble aeroplane parts.
“Our role is often educating people about trees because the human race is spectacular at getting environmental management wrong.
“We feel that our mission is to help humans understand trees so the management can be correct.
“Trees have fabulous survival strategies and often human intervention is damaging and shortens the lifespan of trees.
“Our role is to assist and help arboriculture and the environment go in the right direction.”
The Saving Amy project should be finished next year.
Mr Loudon said: “The exhibition’s focus is on children and younger people and the various messages that it brings.
“The museum is very focused on the bigger picture as well as the plane and the circumstances of Amy’s death.
“People from around the world are donating parts from the type of plane Amy flew.
“The plane itself was completely lost. There’s one piece of wood that a sailor found. They were searching for her and that’s the only thing they found.”
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