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Malcolm Campbell
Major Sir Malcolm Campbell MBE (11 March 1885 – 31 December 1948) was a British racing motorist and motoring journalist. He gained the world speed record on land and on water at various times, using vehicles called Blue Bird, including a 1921 Grand Prix Sunbeam. His son, Donald Campbell, carried on the family tradition by holding both land speed and water speed records.
Campbell was born on 11 March 1885 in Chislehurst, Kent, the only son of William Campbell, a Hatton Garden diamond seller. He attended the independent Uppingham School. In Germany, learning the diamond trade, he gained an interest in motorbikes and races. Returning to Britain, he worked for two years at Lloyd's of London for no pay, then for another year at £1 a week.
Between 1906 and 1908, he won all three London to Land's End Trials motorcycle races. In 1910, he began racing cars at Brooklands. He christened his car Blue Bird, painting it blue, after seeing the play The Blue Bird by Maurice Maeterlinck at the Haymarket Theatre.
Campbell married Marjorie Dagmar Knott in 1913, but they divorced two years later.
Campbell then married Dorothy Evelyn Whittall in 1920; their son Donald was born in 1921, and their daughter, Jean, in 1923. Dorothy, who became Lady Campbell when he was knighted in 1931, later described him as "quite unfitted for the role of husband and family man". They divorced in 1940.
Campbell married Betty Nicory in 1945 in Chelsea.
Campbell wrote a number of "motoring mystery" novels including Salute to the Gods which was the source material for the 1939 motion picture Burn 'Em Up O'Connor. In 1935, for the Ford Motor Company, he narrated the short film, Your Driving Test, which provided advice to prospective drivers on how to pass the new driving test that had been introduced in the UK that year.
At the outbreak of the First World War, Campbell initially enlisted as a motorcycle dispatch rider and fought at the Battle of Mons in August 1914. Shortly afterwards he was commissioned as a second lieutenant in the 5th Battalion, Queen's Own Royal West Kent Regiment, a Territorial Force unit, on 2 September 1914. He was soon drafted into the Royal Flying Corps, where he was a ferry pilot, for his instructors believed he was too clumsy to make the grade as a fighter pilot.
Malcolm Campbell
Major Sir Malcolm Campbell MBE (11 March 1885 – 31 December 1948) was a British racing motorist and motoring journalist. He gained the world speed record on land and on water at various times, using vehicles called Blue Bird, including a 1921 Grand Prix Sunbeam. His son, Donald Campbell, carried on the family tradition by holding both land speed and water speed records.
Campbell was born on 11 March 1885 in Chislehurst, Kent, the only son of William Campbell, a Hatton Garden diamond seller. He attended the independent Uppingham School. In Germany, learning the diamond trade, he gained an interest in motorbikes and races. Returning to Britain, he worked for two years at Lloyd's of London for no pay, then for another year at £1 a week.
Between 1906 and 1908, he won all three London to Land's End Trials motorcycle races. In 1910, he began racing cars at Brooklands. He christened his car Blue Bird, painting it blue, after seeing the play The Blue Bird by Maurice Maeterlinck at the Haymarket Theatre.
Campbell married Marjorie Dagmar Knott in 1913, but they divorced two years later.
Campbell then married Dorothy Evelyn Whittall in 1920; their son Donald was born in 1921, and their daughter, Jean, in 1923. Dorothy, who became Lady Campbell when he was knighted in 1931, later described him as "quite unfitted for the role of husband and family man". They divorced in 1940.
Campbell married Betty Nicory in 1945 in Chelsea.
Campbell wrote a number of "motoring mystery" novels including Salute to the Gods which was the source material for the 1939 motion picture Burn 'Em Up O'Connor. In 1935, for the Ford Motor Company, he narrated the short film, Your Driving Test, which provided advice to prospective drivers on how to pass the new driving test that had been introduced in the UK that year.
At the outbreak of the First World War, Campbell initially enlisted as a motorcycle dispatch rider and fought at the Battle of Mons in August 1914. Shortly afterwards he was commissioned as a second lieutenant in the 5th Battalion, Queen's Own Royal West Kent Regiment, a Territorial Force unit, on 2 September 1914. He was soon drafted into the Royal Flying Corps, where he was a ferry pilot, for his instructors believed he was too clumsy to make the grade as a fighter pilot.
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