DESCRIPTION : Prior to 1907, motor-sport was banned on public roads within the UK, forcing drivers to enter races in Europe. To address this situation, Hugh Fortescue Locke-King decided to transform 320 acres of his Brooklands estate near Weybridge in Surrey into the worlds first purpose-built race track, the Brooklands Motor Course. From its opening in July 1907 until the outbreak of the Second World War it became the spiritual home of British motor sport, where numerous world speed and endurance records were established on both two and four wheels. The large area inside the track soon found another purpose - aviation. It was here in 1908 that Alliott Verdon Roe achieved the first flight in a British-built aircraft and, in 1915 Vickers began aircraft production, an industry that would expand and continue into the 1980s. Hardback 192 pages 27cm x 26cm. |
