The Story of Viscount Stephen Piercey
Any visitor looking around the Vickers Viscount aircraft called Stephen Piercey at Brooklands Museum will have little comprehension of the incredible story behind its reappearance at its birthplace Brooklands . Few will know why this aircraft bears that name, fewer still will know that this aircraft was written off in an accident and even fewer will know how a group of largely complete strangers came together to save and preserve it. These pages are here to tell this story to everyone, so that they may better enjoy this fine aircraft. The pages have been produced and donated by Andy Lambert just one of that group.
Background:-
Back in 1990 Brooklands Museum asked me to recover a Vickers Viscount named Stephen Piercey. When I agreed I had no idea how much this one job would come to mean to me, or prepare me for the wonderful people who I would soon meet and with time call my friends as a result of the project. Those people range from Stephen's fantastic parents Ray and Patsy, through his first class and diverse friends like Guy Holman, Tom Singfield, Roger Hargreaves, their wives / partners.
It includes people who worked on the project like project leader Julian Temple, the engineering legend Mick Bates, Viscount Pilots like Jock Bryce and Colin Towle. team leaders like Ron Brant, John Woodhouse and Paul Rainbird. BAF personal like George Burton and Mike Sessions. Lastly my own team Alan, Brian, Ray, Tony and later on the girls that organised the flights we did to raise funds Pat and Christine Lambert. There are many others who were also touched by this project, we all did our part and when it was done we had all become friends. Sadly for me so many of the people above have left this life, but their memory I promise will live on through this aircraft.
What did we achieve? We saved and restored perhaps the best (and certainly the most connected with Brooklands) Viscount. We did it against the odds and with very little money. Most of all we did it with love and perhaps we did it for 'someone special', many of us never got to meet, but who clearly had meant so much to his friends.
Andy Lambert Summer 2019
Above Stephen's parents Ray and Patsy naming the aircraft.
This lovely painting was created by Toby Dixon and is available to purchase as a print 40 x 50cm at a price of £36 inc postage in the UK. The original is also available. Please contact Toby direct at detonation@glaucoma