Tales From the MacRobertson International Air Races

This Royal Historical Society of Victoria exhibition tells the fascinating stories of the entrants in the race including the Dutch plane, Uiver, which is the most famous of the entries even though it came second. It was forced to make an emergency landing in Albury where the locals used the town’s lights to spell A L B U R Y in morse code and then created a make-shift aerodrome on the racetrack using car headlights to con the plane down.

The first aircraft to finish was a De Havilland DH-88 Comet, a specially-designed racing aircraft flown by Charles WA Scott and Tom Campbell Black. Both pilots were much feted in Melbourne – photos show a handsome pair being mobbed by thousands.

Harold Brook was the pilot with the least experience – barely the minimum 100 hours. He had a paying passenger, the 28-year old Miss Ella Lay, who knitted her way to Australia. She was a pilot herself and the only woman to travel the full race distance from Mildenhall in England to Melbourne.