Daily Blog 12/13/2011
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Biggles Forum – a place to talk about Biggles • View topic – The Vickers Vandal
The illustrations obviously and unmistakably depict a Walrus/Seagull-V, albeit with an inline engine. Incidentally, the author of the definitive Walrus and Stranraer book has assured me the old Shagbat never ever used anything but a radial. Funny that it is depicted in Biggles with what looks like the Rolls double row 12 cylinder (as used in the Viking IV amphib). Anyway, the Seagull entered service in ’35 and BFA was published in ’34, but presumably Johns knew about the Seagull much earlier than its service date, being editor of Pop. Flying. Perhaps he showed Sindall pictures as a guide for the illustrations, and for whatever reason decided it should have a Viking engine. Once again, I’d dearly love to know what the author-illustrator relationship was.
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Biggles – Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
“Biggles” (nickname for James Bigglesworth), a pilot and adventurer, is the title character and main hero of the Biggles series of youth-oriented adventure books written by W. E. Johns.
He first appeared in the story “The White Fokker”, published in the first issue of Popular Flying magazine, in 1932. The first collection of Biggles stories, The Camels are Coming, was published that same year. The series was continued until the author’s death in 1968, eventually spanning nearly a hundred volumes – including novels and short story collections – most, but not all, of the latter with a common setting and time frame.
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SCALE MODEL NEWS: EXHIBITION OF BOX-ART FROM THE FRENCH HELLER KIT COMPANY
Gallerie 64bis is showing original art through the whole history of the French Heller kit company, from 1957 through to the present. The exhibition brings together some 60 original works by artists such as Michel Bez, Francis Bergèse, and Daniel Bechennec. These are little-known names outside their native country perhaps, but their skills are well worth a closer look – at the show if you can, or via the internet if you can’t. Either way, it’s good to see paintings free of the necessary commercial surroundings of titles and descriptive texts on the boxes.