The Air Adventures of Biggles

In 1932, William Earl Johns, a former British bomber pilot, published the first of his 'Biggles' stories in the Popular Flying magazine.

The story was well received and so he began to write more tales of the fictional pilot and adventurer, Squadron Commander James Bigglesworth.

The series of books which followed were a terrific hit worldwide, with W E Johns going on to write over one hundred books and short stories, which were translated into over a dozen different languages. There was also a movie, a comic strip, a TV show, and even a video game featuring the Biggles character!

With such an exciting series of action and adventure stories, they were perfect for radio, but at a time when the US was already moving on to television, old time radio dramas were taking more of a back seat, so it was Australia who finally grabbed the baton and ran with it, producing this thrilling WWI and WWII air combat old time radio serial drama in 1949.

The Air Adventures of Biggles shows were excellently produced, with superb sound effects and exciting music, and they stayed true to the stories written by their author and relatively true to history, with Biggles flying several British military aircraft, such as Sopwith Camels during World War I, Hawker Hurricanes and Spitfires in World War II, right through to the Hawker Hunter fighter jet fighter in a postwar adventure, Biggles in the Terai.

Over a thousand, fifteen minute, episodes were produced between July 1949 until March 1954, but most of these appear to have been lost over time. I will keep searching for more, but in the meantime I hope you'll enjoy listening to the ones Joy and I will be adding to RUSC over the coming weeks.

Happy listening my friends,