Maurice Wickstead – Lifelong Aviation Enthusiast

Maurice Wickstead served with Air India at London Heathrow Airport roughly between 1971 and 1982, having arrived there from Trans-Canada Airlines and Scandinavian Airlines System (SAS). In his own words, “ ir India was a great outfit to work for, oft times chaotic, but great fun and the camaraderie developed there has lasted well beyond our tenure, since many of us although now a lot older, have remained in contact for all these years.”
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​Subsequently he embarked on a new leisure time 'career' as an aviation author, specializing in airline and air transport history. Most of his output over the last thirty-odd years has been directed towards international aviation magazines on a regular basis, and also has two small books on the history of the Douglas Dakota and a complete history of every British airline company since 1919. to his name. More recently, he has had published the histories of Air India, Indian Airlines, Pakistan International, together with a history of every (as far as he could discover) Indian airline. Currently under construction is the story of Biman Bangladesh. In fact, he has been in and around aviation all his life - from making model aeroplanes to aircraft spotting at Heathrow in the propeller era hey-dey and in retirement, with light aircraft and the local flying club. 
 
Among the items in his collection of ephemera are a 1941 Tata timetable, a number of AI Annual reports dating from early post-war.

​The three-part series on the history of Air India was was published in Aviation News (Dec 2003-Feb 2004). His in-depth study of the history of the airline, and passion for Air India is evident in his writings. He has been prolific writer and has published several magazine articles for various major UK and US aviation periodicals.  'British Dakotas' was published ,around 1985, followed by 'European Dakotas' in 1988, both were limited production runs by a small-time publisher and one would be very lucky to find copies for sale these days.  Similarly, around five years ago, he authored a complete condensed history of every British airline company since 1919 - again this was a small run brought out on DVD because of the text size.