RATHEN biplane (George Morrice, John Scott and George Dean, Rathen near Fraserburgh, Scotland)

   This machine was built by three friends in 1911 with the object of competing for the Daily Mail .1,000 prize then on offer for a flight between Glasgow and Edinburgh. Morrice and Scott, originally from Buchan, returned from America and set up an engineering works at Rathen in conjunction with Dean, who was from England.
   The aircraft structure was the work of Morrice and Scott and the engine was Dean's handiwork. It was to be flown by a pilot named Nutter from Nelson in Lancashire. Dean was apparently aiming to make a machine capable of flying the Atlantic, hoping to win the much larger prize on offer. However the aircraft was not completed, work being discontinued when Dean, who had a marital problem, disappeared.
   The type of machine can be seen from the only available photograph, which shows a single-seater biplane with an elegant fuselage of circular frames and stringers. The wings had straight leading and curved trailing edges, blending into rounded wing tips. Among the parts are six-cylinder barrels and two propellers with corrugated blades, the latter probably bought from Cochrane or Beney.

   Power: 60hp Dean probably water-cooled
   Data
   Span 22ft
   Length 20ft
   Speed 68mph