- the GBCT
- 3 days ago
- 2 min read
Don came from a family of aviation enthusiasts. His father took him to Hendon to watch flying displays during the 1930s. His eldest brother was headhunted by De Havilland to work on the Mosquito, a British multi-role combat aircraft, introduced during the Second World War and his second brother was called up to join the RAF and work on Halifax bombers. He flew missions dropping agents and supplies in France and North Africa and was then part of the D-Day evacuation. His sister lived on a farm adjacent to Booker Aerodrome, where he spent many weekends and holidays watching Tiger Moths, Avro Ansons, Airspeed Oxfords and many more.
Apart from planes, Don was interested in photography and had his own darkroom and equipment long before he joined the film industry. He. was still a teenager when the war ended and the family moved from High Wycombe to Brighton, where he started an apprenticeship in electrical engineering. He completed his City and Guilds and Higher National Certificate and eventually became a freelance electrical engineer.
A phone call from the Labour Exchange in 1955 changed the course of his life. He was offered three days work running a generator for Brighton Film Studios, a base for TV Commercials, as well as a number of low budget feature films. Their rented generator kept slowing down and extinguishing the set lights. Those three days led to a full time job as an electrician, working on various productions including Doctor at Large (1957) and A Night to Remember (1958). His aviation interest made him their go-to cameraman when it came to filming from aircraft and helicopters. By 1964, he was credited on IMDB as a Camera Assistant and by 1986, he was a Cinematographer with credits for Emanuelle in Soho (1981) and Screamtime (1983).
The Director of Screamtime was Stanley Long, who Don had assisted in 1964 on Circlorama Cavalcade, a re-make of the original film Russian Roundabout. Circlorama is a process developed by the Russian professor E Goldovsky of the Moscow Cinema Research Institute, involving 11 cameras in a circle facing outwards and projecting on to screens, thereby achieving 360 degree horizontal viewing. Don was on the central camera - No.6. He bought it after filming was complete, converted it to 16mm and kept it for many years. Apart from filming, Don was also a motorbike enthusiast and raced in the early sixties until family responsibilities took priority.
He learned to fly and owned a number of small planes, including a Jodel D11, a Tiger Moth and a Currie Wot, which he built over the course of nine years. The original Currie Wot was a single seater bi-plane built by J. R. Currie in 1937 and so named when Currie tired of people asking what he’d call it, replied: "Call it Wot you blooming well like”. When he wasn’t flying, filming or racing, Don relaxed by painting in oils and merged his two passions when he became a member of the Guild of Aviation Artists.
Happy Birthday, Don. The GBCT wishes you a great day and many good memories of your adventurous life on land and high above it.
