AVRO HERITAGE MUSEUM

EDWIN ALLIOTT VERDON ROE
(Monochrome Photograph - Top Right)
In 1893 Edwin Alliott Verdon Roe, at the age of 16, started a 5 year apprenticeship with the Lancashire and Yorkshire Railway Works at Horwich. He was a talented inventor, always ready to make modification to make machines more efficient. In the workshop he made the railway coupling on display (loaned by Eric Verdon Roe, his grandson). Alliott tried to sell it without success. He may never have followed his aeronautical career if he had been successful. He was passionate about training his workers and many manufacturers, including the RAF, followed his lead, creating training manuals for their aircraft technicians.


FREDERICK JAMES VERNON HOLMES
(Monochrome Photograph - Middle Left)
From an early Company record A.V. Roe & Company created three gentlemen apprenticeships. Frederick J. V. Holmes was indentured 20th December 1912. The indenture on display is for Mr J. R. Holmes (the father) of Frederick Holmes (great uncle of our president Harry Holmes and loaned by him). Frederick's father paid £25 and it is signed by himself, Frederick (the Apprentice), Edwin Alliott Verdon Roe and Humphrey Verdon Roe for A. V. Roe & company, Brownsfield Mill. Fred was a founder member of the Joy-riding concerns introducing fellow countrymen to aviation as a pleasant recreation and potential alternative form of transport. He was noted as an excellent pilot of the Avro 504 aircraft. In 1919 he with his brother acquired a 504 which he used for joy-riding, His Berkshire Aviation Company carried 10,000 passengers in their first year.

(Monochrome Photo - Bottom) - taken and recorded in Humphrey's diary at Clifton Street, 17th March 1913.Left to right:- Office Boy, Mr Broadsmith, Fred J. V. Holmes, Fred Clifton, T. Kent, Alliott V. Roe, Humphrey V. Roe, Miss Lucy Walker (Secretary), Roy Chadwick (Chief Designer), R. J. Parrott (Works Manager).