Only on the margins of Strathbungo, but having grown up on the margins of an aircraft factory, I love a bit of aviation trivia. This is the story of the crash, the pilot, the flying school, his plane, and a meander into the beginnings of unpowered flight.

Thrilling Crash

On this day, 25 May, almost 100 years ago, East Pollokshields was witness to a “thrilling” plane crash .

The news even reached Portsmouth. But they couldn’t get the pilot’s name right. Portsmouth Evening News, 25 May 1927. Credit: BNA

On 25 May 1927 Leonard Falla set off from Renfrew Aerodrome in his Bristol Type 89A Jupiter Advanced Trainer. He was flying over the city of Glasgow when his plane developed engine trouble. Searching for a suitable landing place, he eyed up the tracks north of Pollokshields East railway station, which were a lot wider then than now. However he caught his right wing on a large signal post, demolishing it, and spun round to crash on the embankment, apparently in a railwayman’s garden. He came to rest opposite the art nouveau Millar & Lang’s Printworks (now McCormick House) on Darnley Street. Excited onlookers were amazed to see the pilot escape with little more than an injury to his nose, and to his pride. He was taken to the infirmary but later released .

Continue reading