Page 4 - Aerotech News and Review July 1 2016

RAF swoops to Palmdale to salute Queen’s 90th
by Dennis Anderson
special to Aerotech News
PALMDALE, Calif.—Children at risk and
recovering from abuse in the Antelope Valley
may never know it, but some of the good an-
gels who swoop in to try and provide them with
brighter days include aviation troops and pilots
of the Royal Air Force and the Royal Navy.
On the occasion of the 90th birthday of
Queen Elizabeth II, the members of 17 Squad-
ron RAF and their Royal Navy comrades hosted
“a little birthday party” at the Rancho Vista
Golf Course.
In the course of the evening, Her Majesty’s
finest presented $5,000 to Kids Charities of the ed to some facts and figures about the queen’s
Antelope Valley.
Echoing the Antelope Valley charity’s motto,
17 Squadron Wing Commander James Beck
presented the oversize check to Kids Charities
CEO Yvette Emard.
He said the United Kingdom forces agree
“that it should never hurt to be a kid.” The re- was retired U.S. Army Maj. Gen. Peter Gravett,
sult of Kids Charities cumulative $4.3 million
distributed over the years is “happy, healthy,
hearty children,” Beck said.
CEO Emard responded, “This is going to do
a lot for the children of the Antelope Valley.”
The funds distribution came from money
raised during 17 Squadron’s recent centenary
that was celebrated at Club Muroc at Edwards
Air Force Base, Calif., themed on a salute to
the 17 Squadron members who flew Hawker
Hurricanes to defeat the Nazi Luftwaffe led by
Hermann Goering during the Battle of Britain.
The RAF squadron that hosted the birthday
party is just a decade older than the Queen
4 Aerotech News and Review
herself, formed in 1916, and deployed to the
Middle East during World War I.
It might be surprising to younger and older
alike that Queen Elizabeth is now 90 years old,
her reign beginning with the last days of the
British Empire and lasting longer even than that rule” over the Commonwealth of Nations,
of her great grandmother, Queen Victoria.
“You might be surprised to know that she is
not the Queen of England,” Wing Cmdr. Beck
said. “That title ended in 1707 with Queen
Anne. Actually, she is the British Monarch.”
For a room filled with friends, and the for-
mally outfitted uniforms of the RAF, the Royal
Navy, and also representatives from the U.S.
Air Force and Army, the entire group was treat-
reign.
At the dinner, officers and non-commis-
sioned officers of all services wore formal
“mess dress,” with decorations. Members of a
British-American society in the guest list wore
kilts, with mess jackets, and ornamental knives
in their long stockings. Among those attending
who headed up the California Military Depart-
ment until retirement last year.
The queen’s reign, Beck explained, began
formally in 1952 when the monarch was 25
years old. She already accumulated worldly
experience during World War II, when as a teen-
ager, she joined the British army and served as
a driver and mechanic.
At 90 years, Wing Commander Beck said the
queen continues “simply as one of the hardest
working people in Britain.”
The Queen, he said, has patronized more than
600 charities, and served as chairperson of more
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than 400 of them.
She has personally dispatched 175,000 tele- Courtesy photograph
grams, and answered 3.5 million pieces of cor- Former U.S. Army Sgt. Danny Bazzell — an
respondence during her record-smashing reign, Edwards Civ-Mil Support Group director — is
now as the monarch who “reigns but does not not “touching” Queen Elizabeth. It’s an incredible
life-size fiberboard likeness.
which span six continents and a quarter of the
earth’s surface.
Although Queen Elizabeth was born on April
21 “in a posh residence” some 90 years ago, the
“birthday of the Monarch” is celebrated in June
“because it simply rains too much in April” in
the British Isles, Beck said.”
A cake set in the corner of the Rancho Vista
dining room featured a cameo of the queen with
the dates, 1926-2016.
“Actually, she has sent 3.5 million, and one,”
piece of personal correspondence, the wing
commander shared proudly.
On the occasion of her 90th birthday cele-
brated at “Rancho Vista Golf Course, Palmdale,
Calif.,” the queen sent hearty thanks and good
wishes to “all the members of 17 Squadron, and
all those in attendance.”
Among those gathered June 11, champagne
glasses were raised in a simple toast.
“Ladies and gentlemen … To the Queen.”
The men in stiff collars, mess jackets, medals
and some in kilts raised their toast, alongside
the women in gowns and finery, and women of
the RAF and Royal Navy in formal uniform.
Personally signed, on her own letterhead,
Queen Elizabeth’s congratulations to her RAF
troops from a Battle of Britain legacy unit will
be framed and put up “on our squadron wall.”
“She does not always send these,” Wing
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July 1, 2016