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Yorkshire Diary: On the trail of tragic airman
Former Leeds Grammar School student Martyn Coope is hoping Yorkshire Diary readers can help him track down a picture of a an airman whose life has fascinated him since childhood.
The man in question is Pilot Officer John Edward Anthony Harrington Fairfax, a Royal Air Force pilot who was killed during the Second World War and whose life is commemorated in a stained glass window in the chapel at the grammar school.
"This appeal is to satisfy an urge I have had since 1961," says Mr Coope, who now lives in Norfolk.
Dedicated
"It was the first day of the school term at Leeds Grammar School and I happened to sit down in the pew next to this window in the school chapel, which was then on Moorlands Road. I looked up and saw this window and that was me gone. My father was in the air force during the war and this window was dedicated to a man who had also been in the air force.
"I spent 10 years sitting by this window every Tuesday morning during church service, which I tended to ignore as the window became such an obsession. It has haunted me ever since, even after I moved out of Yorkshire due to work."
Mr Coope, 58, is a retired air traffic controller who worked at Gatwick, Prestwick and Manchester airports and has always had an interest in aircraft.
The stained glass window carries an inscription to Pilot Officer Fairfax, from Headingley, who was known to friends as 'Tony' and it includes the line: 'For Tony, from Mother.'
Mr Coope, who has learned much about the airman's life, said he was particularly struck by the memorial.
"I learned that he was a pupil of the grammar school and that he never knew his father, who was called John Harrington Fairfax and who is marked on his birth certificate as 'deceased'.
"His mother, Ursula, whose maiden name was Tannet-Walker, remarried in the 1930s and I believe had a son, which means he would have had a half-brother.
"Tony flew sorties over Germany during the war. He was the second person in the RAF to drop a 4,000lb bomb. He was killed during a night training flight after his aircraft hit trees near Banbury, Oxfordshire on October 4, 1941. He was just 21.
"He was actually a contemporary of Arthur Aaron, the only Second World War serviceman from Leeds to be awarded the Victoria Cross, a statue of whom resides at the Eastgate Roundabout.
Picture
"Together with my friend, I am putting together an exhibition about his life for a 1940s-themed weekend, organised by the North Norfolk Railway, in September.
"The only thing I don't have is a picture of Tony, so if anyone out there can help, I would be most grateful."
He added: "I think one of the things which struck me most was it was signed 'For Tony, from Mother.' This was a lady who had already lost her husband and then lost her son in the war."
The stained glass window in question was moved in 1997 when Leeds Grammar School moved to Alwoodley Gates on Harrogate Road.
Martyn Coope can be contacted on 01263 824973 or via e-mail at daisychin97@aol.com.
Real find in Tasmania
WHEN Yorkshire Diary published a picture of a derelict Job Day car, manufactured in Leeds, on July 31, it prompted Bryan Lampford, of Wakefield to send in this picture of what is believed to be the only remaining Job Day car in the world... and it's in Tasmania.
Mr Lampford, 64, came across the vehicle in a museum while on holiday.
He says: "The picture was taken in the Launceston Car Museum in Tasmania, Australia, last year. This car was made in 1914 and, out of a production run of around 300, is believed to be the only one still in existence.
"Production ceased in 1934 when the company turned to manufacturing tea packaging machinery. The museum is proud of its rare example, which was tested in England along with other manufacturers before being brought to Australia in 1917 to be used by the Australian Postal Authority for suburban use.
"This vehicle is one of only three models fitted with Day's own engine, making it a real 'rare bird'. It actually says 'Day Leeds' on the grill in gold lettering."
Warm welcome at school
Your letters
Regarding Yorkshire Diary letters, July 24 about St Stephen's School, it was my first school and the letter from Mrs Bentley brought back fond memories. I started there in 1962, following my two brothers Trevor and Kevin, and have great memories. I particularly remember it had a real fire in the classroom, which made it really nice in those winter months.
I left to go to Ebor Gardens Primary School, which was built as a replacement. I have attached a photograph of St Stephen's for Mrs Bentley and any other people who remember.
Also could I take this opportunity to ask Yorkshire Diary readers if they remember Derbyshire Street Mission in Hunslet (formally the 'ragged boys home'). My mother and father got married there in the 1940s and it has many family ties. Any photographs or information would be nice.
The church replacing the mission is Hunslet Nazarene Church in Lupton Street, LS10. We hold coffee mornings on the first Saturday in the month.
Ian RowleY, 28 Silk Mill Close,Tinshill, email ian.rowley@sky.com
I attended St Stephen's School from 1930 to 1941. My two brothers, Alan and Jim, also attended, as did most of the other kids in our street. I remember Mrs Bentley's brother Sidney, I am still in contact with a girl who was in the same class as Sidney and my brother Alan. I wonder if she remembers the teachers?
There was headmaster Mr Smith and then Messers Hardy, Walldall and Swindells and Misses Smith, Anderson, Thackwray and Jordan and, in the infants, Misses Jordan and Husband.
Jack Lawton, Middleton Terrace, Leeds, email: lawto21@hotmail.com
Guess the year
The Leeds war memorial, erected to honour those who died in both world wars, was designed by sculptor Henry Charles Fehr and features the female figure of Peace on one side and St George defeating the dragon on the other. Above them is an angel carrying six roses – each representing 150,000 UK troops who died in the First World War. In 1998 it was given a 15,000 makeover by a team of conservators who had worked on the Statue of Liberty in New York. It was originally unveiled in 1922 in City Square, but in which year was it moved to The Headrow? Answer next week.
Last week's question: West Yorkshire Playhouse has been visited by the great and good of showbusiness over the years. Ian McKellen has appeared in three shows: The Seagull (1999), The Tempest (1999) and Present Laughter (1998), Christopher Eccleston has appeared in Hamlet in 2002 and Patrick Stewart in Johnson Over Jordan, a play by JB Priestley and Shylock: Shakespeare's Alien, both in 2001. In what year did the theatre open? Answer: 1990.
Did you know?
Did you know that J R R Tolkien, author of The Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit, which is being made into a film to be released next year, lived and worked in Leeds? He was a Reader in English Language at the University of Leeds in 1920 and was later made a professor there. He left in 1925 to move to Oxford. Many of his tales of Middle Earth are thought to have been inspired by his time in Yorkshire. Wetwang is a place in Middle Earth and Yorkshire. Tolkien was also struck by the beauty of the moorland near Otley, which some say he used as a setting for the opening of The Silmarillion, a prequel to The Lord of the Rings. He also wrote a foreword to Walter E Haigh's New Glossary of the Dialect of the Huddersfield District and was a member of the Yorkshire Dialect Society.
EP 7/8/10
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Saturday 26 May 2012
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