SIXTY years ago this month a Worcester-born former Alice Ottley School pupil set out to make aviation history.
Sheila Scott OBE was the first British person to fly solo around the world.
In her single-engined Piper Comanche, she set a record for the longest-distance solo flight and became only the third woman to fly around the world.
Sheila departed London Heathrow Airport on May 18, 1966, and returned on June 20, 1966, doing around 31,000 miles in 189 flying hours over 34 days.
Holding welcoming flowers, Sheila Scott on her arrival at London Airport at the end of her round-the-world flight in June 1966 (Image: Newsquest)
Sheila Scott gets a champagne welcome from sponsor Ken Wood after she touches down in London in her Pipe Comanche single-engine aircraft after flying solo from Cape Town to the English capital in 1967 (Image: Newsquest)
Sheila Scott in around 1971 ahead of a planned third solo world flight (Image: Newsquest)
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Born Sheila Christine Hopkins in April 1922, she changed her surname after starting a career as an actress in 1943.
In 1958 she learned to fly, going solo at Thruxton Aerodrome in Hampshire after nine months of training.
Sheila went on to complete more solo flying feats and wrote books before dying of lung cancer aged 66 at the Royal Marsden Hospital, London, in October 1988 after a year-long battle.
The Worcester Evening News of Friday, October 21, 1988, declared the “international flying ace” to be “Worcester’s most famous daughter of the 20th century”.
It said Sheila set “no fewer than 104 flying records in the 1960s and early 70s”.
She was the daughter of Alderman Harold Hopkins, of Beech Avenue North, who served on Worcester City Council for more than 30 years and ran a large bakery and diary business in Broad Street.
Sheila spent her entire childhood in the city and was a pupil of Alice Ottley for 12 years, distinguishing herself particularly as an athlete.
Sheila Scott’s VIP return visit to Alice Ottley School, Worcester, in 1972 (Image: Newsquest)
Her father once recalled how his daughter’s interest in flying started at the age of six when he took her to a ‘Flying Circus’ on Pitchcroft.
Sheila was awarded the OBE by the Queen in 1968 and Worcester honoured her in 1969 by having her portrait painted by eminent county artist Ernest Waldron West.
Sheila Scott with her OBE in 1968 (Image: Newsquest)
In 1969 Worcester City Council commissioned an oil painting of Sheila Scott by renowned artist Ernest Waldron West (Image: Newsquest)
After her first round-the-world flight, Alice Ottley headmistress Eileene Millest said: “We are very proud of her this morning.”
Sheila Scott is greeted by Mr and Mrs CP Norbury and Lady Brinton to the annual dinner of the Worcestershire Association at the House of Commons in October 1967 (Image: Newsquest)
In 1968 Sheila Scott became the only honorary woman pilot in the Fleet Air Arm. Here Vice Admiral Sir Donald Gibson presents her wings (Image: Newsquest)
Guests gathered for the unveiling of a blue plaque for Sheila Scott at Royal Grammar School Worcester in 2023 (Image: Newsquest)