South Yorkshire Times, September 15th, 1933
“Flighty” Grandma
Air Flip From Blackburn to Blackpool
A Mile Up
Mrs. Greaves
Here is a picture of a Wombwell grandmother. She is as young in spirit as she is in looks for recently she undertook a fairly lengthy aeroplane flight. She is Mrs. Mary Greaves, wife of ex-Sergeant Greaves, 5, Foulstone Row.
Sergt. Greaves is a member of the ground staff of Sir Alan Cobham’s air circus and in that capacity will be visiting Wombwell next Sunday. In the war he served in the York and Lancaster Regiment and was working at Darfield Main, where he has been employed nearly all his life, when Sir Alan Cobham took him on. In two years he has flown many thousands of miles and has visited many times most of the towns and cities of the country. For an employee of an air circus life is as full as it is thrilling and eventful. This week, for example, the party with which he is travelling will give performances at Sheffield, Rhyl, Manchester, Preston, Widnes, and Wombwell. Sergt. Greaves is in his 60th year.
The latest flip into cloudland embarked upon by Mrs. Greaves was from Blackburn to Blackpool, a distance of about thirty miles. She had gone over to visit her husband and when a crack pilot offered to take her to the next station she accepted without hesitation. “It was a delightful day and a delightful experience,” Mrs. Greaves told a “Times” reporter. The only complaint I had to make was that the journey was not long enough. I can well understand experienced travellers preferring to make journeys by air. I could not have been more comfortable if I had been reclining in a hammock. At one part of the journey, we rose to a height of 4,000 feet without the slightest sensation of bumping. I had flown before in an airways liner, but the real joy of rushing through the cool air is only to be found in travelling in a smaller machine. We made the journey in a Gypsy Moth. Mrs. Greaves believes that the maxim “distance lends enchantment” applies with special force to aviation. At a height of nearly a mile even industrial Lancashire looked beautiful