I know a lot of young boys look up to their fathers and revere them as everyday heroes. Gee shucks Dad. You’re the greatest, but that’s a somewhat Hollywood sugar and saccharin depiction which, in my case, was a long way from the truth. In the 60s and 70s I looked at my dear Papa and thought You’re so boring. I wish you were someone famous !

It turns out he did have two very brief brushes with fame and strangely both occurring on aircraft.

The first was in 1946 as a 25 year old. He was travelling to Tokyo, Japan as part of the South East Asia Command. He was a junior clerk for Supreme Allied Commander Lord Louis Mountbatten and had been stationed in Kandy, Ceylon, now Sri Lanka. It was a wild wintry night, the plane was having difficulty landing and circled Tokyo airport for what seemed like hours. My Dad busied himself re-reading his newspaper and finishing off the crossword until eventually landing. He didn’t think much of it more than a bit of a bumpy flight.

Also on that flight was Air Marshall Sir Robert Victor Goddard who thought himself a clairvoyant with a penchant for the paranormal who put down his interpretation of events on paper. This was then published some years later in the Saturday Evening Post and picked up by film director Leslie Norman, father of critic Barry.

Fast forward to 1955 and we have the British supernatural film The Day My Number Came Up with esteemed thespian Denholm Elliot playing Flight Lieutenant MacKenzie based on, you guessed it, my Daddy ! (If you want to be pedantic, my old man was a Squadron Leader but let’s not allow mere facts get in the way of fiction.)

I’ve watched this film a few times, several with my father who chuckled and chortled throughout. He was totally unaware of any dreams or prophesies depicted in it. His mind was probably more on a particular English Wren he had encountered in Colombo, Ceylon (my Mum!) when he boarded that plane. To be honest, the film is not that good. It’s more about the context for me.

My father’s second in-flight encounter with celebrity occurred in the late 1960s. He was on a flight from London to Glasgow and was seated amidst an up and coming rock’n’roll group The Rolling Stones. By the description he gave I reckon his cabin chum was bassist Bill Wyman although my Dad’s observation was some smelly young man with long greasy hair .Knowing the answer, I enquired whether he was able to get an autograph from Bill and the boys. His musical tastes being more of the crooners of the 30s and 40s, it didn’t occur to him. He just re-read his newspaper and finished the crossword rather then strike up any conversation. Just think of the dosh I could have made on ebay if my Dad wasn’t so square.

You’ll probably expect me to finish up this article with my Dad was my real star but that’s just not going to happen.

I will give the old fart a few brownie points for making me smile every time I see or hear about Denholm Elliot or Bill Wyman though.

Fly high Dad.

(Post by John Allan, from Bridgetown, Western Australia – August 2023)