This edited article about the Duchess of Bedford originally appeared in Look and Learn issue number 703 published on 5 July 1975.

A picture history of Woburn Abbey, home of the Duke and Duchess of Bedford, showing the flying Duchess, (bottom, right of centre)

Supposing your grandmother, or the grandmother of one of your friends, suddenly announced that she was going to learn to fly.

Think of the surprise and the raised eyebrows, and the exclamations of “Grandma, don’t be so silly” there would be. Much as we take airplanes for granted nowadays very few of us, let alone elderly ladies, ever learn to be pilots.

So you can imagine what a fuss there was nearly fifty years ago when, at the age of sixty, the Duchess of Bedford, grandmother of the present Duke of Bedford, took up flying. And the even greater fuss there was some years later when she took off in her de Havilland Gypsy plane one day, disappeared, and was never seen again.

Back in the 1920s, airplanes were not the smooth-travelling, streamlined affairs that they are today. Flying them was still an adventure. It was the age of pilots who set off across the world in tiny planes with cans of extra petrol stacked behind them, and little more than hope in their hearts and determination in their minds, to guarantee that they would land safely somewhere on the other side – in India, in Australia, in America.

It was the age of the pioneers and the trailblazers. Colonel Lindbergh became one of the world’s heroes by making the first solo flight across the Atlantic from New York to Paris in 1927; Amy Johnson was the first woman to fly solo from England to Australia in 1930.

Flights like these helped to pave the way for the airliners of the future. The men and women who made them were dedicated to flying, to proving that there was no part of the world which could not be reached by air.

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This edited article about the Second World War originally appeared in Look and Learn issue number 703 published on 5 July 1975.

Nick Alkemade reached for the rip cord and pulled it right away, a charred thread with no effect whatsoever

Behind him was his plane, turned into a ball of fire and smoke after an enemy attack. Below him, well over three miles away, was the ground. And nothing but clouds stood between I. M. Chisov of the U.S.S.R. and what seemed like a swift end on the mountains.

Chisov had fallen from his plane, an Ilyushin 4, before he had had time to strap on his parachute harness in January, 1942, during the Second World War.

Falling at a speed which could have been anything between a hundred and a hundred and eighty miles an hour, Chisov plunged towards the peaks. Bouncing off the edge of a snow-covered ravine, he slid to the bottom, shattering his spine and fracturing his pelvis or hip bone.

But he was alive after a fall of 21,980 ft. (6,700 metres), having made the longest descent without a parachute on record.

Few men can know the fears of such an experience. But one who did share them was Sergeant Nick Alkemade of the R.A.F. who jumped from his blazing bomber over Germany during a war-time raid. When Alkemade pulled the rip cord of his parachute, he found that it had been reduced to ashes by the fire.

He fell from 20,000 ft. (6,096 metres) and landed in a deep drift of snow on the edge of a pine forest some miles outside Berlin.

His only injuries were a broken wrist and leg. He was captured by the Germans, who at first refused to believe his story until he showed them the charred remains of his parachute.

Before he was sent to a prisoner of war camp, Alkemade was given a signed and witnessed document testifying that he had fallen without a parachute from a height of over three miles.

“Without that,” they told him. “No one will believe your story after the war.”

This edited article about Pompeii originally appeared in Look and Learn issue number 702 published on 28 June 1975.

The last days of Pompeii by Graham Coton

In Pompeii, the morning of August 24th, in the year A.D. 79, had dawned as bright and clear as it normally did at that time of the year. Peasants were now working busily among the vines and olive groves on the slopes beneath the shadow of slumbering Mount Vesuvius, which had not spewed lava from its volcanic depths for centuries. The farmers who had risen particularly early, were already wheeling their two-wheeled carts piled with fruits and vegetables towards the market. There they would find more than enough buyers from among the wealthy Romans who used the fashionable resort of Pompeii as a pleasant refuge from the sultry heat of the Roman summers. In the streets, people were discussing the forthcoming elections and laying wagers on the gladiators who were due to fight in the amphitheatre before an audience of some ten thousand people. At the bottom of the steep street that led down to the harbour, men were busily unloading a cargo of wine and oil.

As the morning progressed, the city became more busy than ever. Slaves scurried among the crowds, shopping for their mistresses and masters, and as usual, the public baths were full of wealthy men of all ages who used them as a club where they could discuss the latest tit-bits of gossip that had been brought from Rome by some of the more recent arrivals. For the children, it was a particularly happy time because they were not at school. Noisily, they ran around the rooms and courtyards of their villas, playing hide-and-seek with their friends, or else they trundled their hoops through the streets, keeping a wary eye out for the charioteers who frequently came clattering along the rough roadways. In short, that August morning was very much like any other summer morning for the carefree population of Pompeii.

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This edited article about Captain Reeks of the Stella originally appeared in Look and Learn issue number 702 published on 28 June 1975.

The sinking of the steamer, Stella, in 1899

A passenger staggered along the heaving deck of the steamer Stella as it bucked and rolled through the waves. He found the captain at the foot of the ladder leading to the bridge.

“The fog is getting much thicker and we don’t seem to be slackening speed, captain,” said the passenger. “Is that quite the safe thing to do?”

The captain frowned. “I think you can leave matters of safety to me, sir,” he replied heavily. “When I think it is right to reduce speed, I shall do so and not before.”

With that, the skipper, Captain Charles Reeks, continued on his way to the bridge. He bitterly resented criticism of his rivalry with the skipper of another steamer, the Ibex, which shuttled between Southampton and Guernsey, the second largest of the Channel Islands.

Each aimed to make the faster trip to Guernsey and so please the holidaymakers from London and the south-east.

For some time, however, the Ibex had been docking at St. Peter Port, the island’s capital first. Sometimes, she was only a few minutes ahead of the Stella. On other occasions, she was as much as twelve hours in the lead.

This rivalry reached its peak at the Easter holiday of 1899. The Ibex had left Southampton fifteen minutes ahead of its rival. Captain Reeks was determined that the Stella would catch up the other ship and pass it, whatever the cost.

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This edited article about the Great Fire of London originally appeared in Look and Learn issue number 701 published on 21 June 1975.

The Great Fire of London by Peter Jackson

It was between one and two a.m. in the morning of September 2, 1666, when the fire broke out which was to lay London in ashes. It occurred in a baker’s shop in Pudding Lane, in the City, and at first it was not taken seriously, least of all by the Lord Mayor of London, Sir Thomas Bludworth. He was annoyed at being summoned from his bed on so slight a matter. “A woman might put it out,” he exclaimed scornfully. It was this “small” fire which was to destroy 13,200 houses in four days, and render some 200,000 citizens homeless.
When the fire began, a strong north-east wind was blowing, and before daybreak, the flames had spread to the adjacent streets, consuming the ancient buildings like paper. As street after street were engulfed, the panic of the population mounted to hysterical proportions. Rich people dug pits in their gardens to store their plate or jewels. Others went out into the streets to offer huge sums for the removal of their goods by horse and cart, before joining in the mad rush for the Thames which was soon covered with boats and barges laden with people and furniture. The booksellers who were then congregated in Paternoster Row rushed their volumes, valued at £150,000 in all, into the crypt of St. Paul’s, where in a few hours they were buried beneath thousands of tons of burning ashes.

By daybreak, the fire had reached the river quays, where the conflagration spread because of the large stocks of oil, tallow, timber, spirits and other highly inflammable goods. After this, the flames drove westward along the river bank. Thousands of people had now fled to the heights of Hampstead and Highgate, from where they watched the fire consume their city.

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This edited article about Le Mans originally appeared in Look and Learn issue number 700 published on 14 June 1975.

The Mercedes crash at Le Mans in 1955 which Fangio managed to escape, by Graham Coton

Combine all the high-speed thrills of a motor-car race lasting for 24 hours with all the fun of the fairground and you have a first class public attraction.

That was the experience of the French motor-racing authorities who had the inspiration to initiate the Le Mans 24-hour race on a public roads course just outside the town in South West France in 1923. It attracts hundreds of thousands of people every year, and attendances of well over half-a-million have been recorded.

Yet, it can be the most boring and complicated race in the world to watch. Over fifty cars of all shapes and sizes may start on the 13.5 kilometre (about 9 mile) course, and it takes the fastest less than five minutes to complete one lap.

After only four or five laps, the slower cars are already being overtaken by the faster ones and long before the first of the twenty-four hours has gone by it has become impossible to sort out the racing order without reference to the complicated and huge electronic scoreboard above the pits.

The vast majority of the many thousands who spend a day and a night at the track only know what is going on from the excited commentaries over the public address system and their transistor radios.

But many of them never see the race anyway. For them, Le Mans is more the Mecca for an annual carnival than a sporting event.

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This edited article about Poon Lim originally appeared in Look and Learn issue number 700 published on 14 June 1975.

All was calm aboard the S.S. Ben Lomond as it steamed through the warm waters of the Atlantic Ocean near the equator on 23rd November, 1942, during the Second World War.

Suddenly, the peace of the ship was shattered as an enemy torpedo pierced the ship’s hull and exploded with a loud clap like thunder.

As water rushed through the hole torn in the metal hull, the ship listed to one side. Hurriedly, the crew took to their lifeboats. Among them was Second Steward Poon Lim who flung himself into the ocean and swam strongly towards a raft and scrambled on to it.

Strong currents carried him away from the sinking ship and the other survivors in their boats, and soon he was alone on the vast ocean.

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This edited article about Chicago originally appeared in Look and Learn issue number 698 published on 31 May 1975.

The Great Chicago Fire of 1871 by Neville Dear

Mrs. O’Leary was milking her cow in the barn. The cow kicked over an oil lamp and set light to a pile of tinder-dry hay. And that began the great Chicago fire of 1871.

Well, that is what many people believed. Others thought that some lunatic fire-raiser began it all.

Whatever the truth about the beginning, the sequel was staggering in its immensity.

By the evening of October 10, less than forty-eight hours later, 1,900 acres of Chicago was a smoke-wreathed, smouldering scar upon the land of Illinois.

The flames had devoured some 13,000 buildings, among them 1,600 shops with some of the finest merchandise in the world upon their counters, some sixty churches and 600 factories.

Over 2,000 street lamps were so badly damaged that they had to be replaced. More than 122 miles of pavement was destroyed.

In all, almost £100 million worth of damage was done. And 100,000 people were made homeless.

But if nobody actually knew how the fire started, why was it allowed to spread at such a rate? Why did nobody realize that Chicago in 1871 was like a bonfire waiting to be lit?

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This edited article about the San Francisco earthquake originally appeared in Look and Learn issue number 695 published on 10 May 1975.

The San Francisco earthquake by Graham Coton

In Ancient times the Greeks were convinced that the world was supported on the shoulders of the god Atlas. Occasionally, when he was feeling tired, he would shift his load from shoulder to shoulder, with the result that the buildings on Earth were shaken to their very foundations. In this manner, the Greeks sought to explain away those volcanic convulsions of the Earth’s surface which we know as earthquakes, the most terrifying of all the natural forces of nature.

The average earthquake lasts from a few seconds to a few minutes, but in that brief span of time, they have destroyed whole cities and brought about the death of thousands. It was such an earthquake that struck San Francisco on April 18th, 1906, finally reducing America’s ninth largest city to little more than a heap of smouldering rubble.

It struck at dawn, signalling its arrival by a growling rumble that swiftly built up into a gigantic continuous roar. Seconds later, buildings began to topple, slowly, almost gracefully at first, before bombarding the streets with great pieces of masonry. Wide streets and avenues were torn with crevices six feet wide. Railway lines were buckled and then flung into the air like gigantic javelins. The whole city heaved.

But worse, far worse, was to follow.

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This edited article about the Titanic originally appeared in Look and Learn issue number 668 published on 2 November 1974.

On the deck of the Titanic

Titanic sinks as her passengers attempt to escape the disaster in the inadequate number of lifeboats by Peter Jackson

The sinking of the Titanic by Graham Coton

The famous Titanic liner was certainly aptly named. At the time of the disaster, when she sank on her maiden voyage in 1912, she was the largest ship afloat, could carry 3,320 persons, and weighed 46,328 tons.

The Titanic was of an all-steel construction and inside her steel hull were watertight compartments, each 60 feet long, which were entered, one from another, through watertight doors. She was, it was claimed at the time, unsinkable!

Armed with this confidence in the ship, the pride of the White Star shipping line, the first passengers set sail from Britain for America on the Titanic’s first and last voyage.

The water of the Atlantic on the night of the disaster was very calm and flat. She was steaming at her top speed of 22 knots and making good time.

The icebergs which float south from the Greenland coast can be a great hazard to ships on the busy routes between Europe and North America. They chill the air around them so that they are often surrounded by a cloud of mist.

And on that fateful night of April 14, 1912, one of these treacherous icebergs could not be seen from the ship as it sailed happily along. It struck the Titanic a gigantic blow ripping a hole right along the ship’s side below the water line.

She took two hours to go down and during that time 652 passengers managed to get into the lifeboats, and a further 60 into collapsible boats. In all, 712 people were saved but 1,513 others perished. These included the famous journalist W. T. Stead and John Jacob Astor, the American inventor.

The tragedy of the disaster was that many more people could have survived. Less than twenty miles away from the stricken vessel was the Leyland liner Californian which could have come to the Titanic’s rescue had its radio operator been on duty. Only the arrival of the Cunard liner Carpathia 20 minutes after the Titanic went down prevented further loss of life.

As a result of the disaster, the first International Convention for Safety of Life at Sea was called in London in 1913. At this meeting rules were drawn up requiring that every ship should have lifeboat space for each person on board. The Titanic, incidentally, had only 1,178 boat spaces for the 2,224 on board. Also, that lifeboat drills be held during each voyage; and, since the Californian had not heard the distress calls of the Titanic, that ships maintain a 24-hour radio watch. The International Ice Patrol was also established to warn ships of ice in the North Atlantic shipping lanes.