WE return to the old Clifton airfield again this week – or the York Municipal Aerodrome, to give it its correct title.

A couple of weeks ago, following the demolition of the last Handley Page repair workshops at Clifton Moor, we looked back at the aerodrome’s wartime history, principally as a repair depot for Halifax bombers.

This week, we go back to the aerodrome’s earlier years, when it really was a municipal airfield for York.

The aerodrome was opened on July 4, 1936, by Lord Swinton, the Minister for Air.

The RAF flew the minister from London, and he had lunch at the Mansion House. The then Lord Mayor of York, Coun WH Shaw, presided over the opening ceremony at the aerodrome itself. Lord Swinton, seen speaking in our first photograph, presented the mayor with a licence authorising the city council to “conduct an aerodrome”, according to the photograph’s caption.

The new aerodrome was favourably reviewed in the July 9, 1936, edition of Flight, the commercial aviation magazine.

“Suffering, as we so often do, from the fact that aerodromes are so often and almost inevitably a long way from the centre of the town which they serve, it is pleasant to find a new aerodrome which is almost within walking distance,” the magazine’s correspondent noted. “York’s aerodrome is situated…. less than two miles from the famous Minster.”

The Flight correspondent was also impressed by the aerodrome’s surface. “The prepared area is of circular form with runs of 600 yards in every direction, but further parts will be levelled as circumstances demand. What is more important, the approaches are excellent and the surface – levelled by En-Tout-Cas – above criticism.”

As reported in The Press a couple of weeks ago, the aerodrome was never used for chartered or scheduled flights. But during the late 1930s, before the war intervened, a flying club was based there, and it was used for private flights and air taxis. Our remaining photographs, all taken in the 1930s, show:

* Harold Sydney Reeder with an Avro Cadet, one of seven aircraft owned by the flying club. The fleet also included a Hornet, Gypsy Moths and Leopard Moths.

* Mr R Reeder standing by Gypsy II Moth G-AFKY. After the Munich Crisis, the Moths belonging to York Flying Club were pressed into use as part of the Civil Air Guard.

* Henry King in a Gypsy I Moth at the aerodrome in about 1938.

* The fire tender at York Municipal Aerodrome, pictured in front of the original club hangar in 1936. It was a modified second-hand 16hp Super Snipe touring car and trailer.