HAPPY HUNDREDTH BIRTHDAY TO ROY CROSS

Congratulations to the former EAGLE artist Roy Cross on his hundredth birthday today (23rd April). Between 1960 and 1963, Roy illustrated twenty three cutaway drawings and a series of front page illustrations of cars for EAGLE and aircraft for Swift. His EAGLE cutaways covered a wide range of vehicles, including motor cycles, aircraft, a motor home, H.M.S. Devonshire and a Project Mercury Space Capsule. Born in Southwark in 1924, he joined the Air Training Corps at Camberwell in 1938, leaving school at fifteen in 1940 and working for a shipping agent, before getting a job with Fairey Aviation during the War as a technical illustrator for training manuals, having impressed with line drawings of aircraft which were published in the Air Training Corps Gazette. He was essentially self taught, although he briefly attended the Camberwell College of Arts and Crafts and later St. Martin's School of Fine Arts. Of his formal training he later said "...they couldn't teach me to draw planes," although he admitted "I learned a bit there, though." 

In 1943, he was commissioned to illustrate a book called The Birth of the Royal Air Force. After the War, he learned airbrush techniques when he joined a commercial art studies, 'Technical Designs Ltd'. In 1947, he became a freelance artist, producing artwork for several aircraft magazines in both Britain and the U.S.A. and advertising art for the aircraft industry, bus body manufacturers and other transport manufacturers. He also illustrated several more books, including one of his own, called Supersonic Aircraft in 1956, having become a member of the Society of Aviation Artists in 1954.   

While working for EAGLE and Swift, he also continued to write books on aircraft, producing two 'pocketbooks' for Batsford, about fighter aircraft and bombers. After EAGLE, he drew illustrations for the boxes of Airfix model kits from 1964 - 74. Beginning with aircraft kits, he also produced illustrations of cars, tanks, other military vehicles, railway engines, spacecraft and even people. In 1972 he illustrated a series of picture cards for Brooke Bond tea for their series 'History of Aviation'. The picture alongside is an example of Roy's work for Airfix and shows a De Haviland Mosquito in action.  

 In 1973, he moved into fine art, painting sailing ships, which proved so popular and lucrative that he was able to resign from Airfix and concentrate on this new area. His interest in ships had actually begun as a boy when he had gone for long walks along the Thames with his father, watching the merchant shipping on the river. He completed his first painting of a sailing ship - a Spanish Galleon, at the age of ten! His work found an enthusiastic market in America when Malcolm Henderson, whose London Gallery sold his paintings, relocated to Washington and established a new gallery there in 1975. Unsurprisingly, in view of his past experience, his work was noted for his attention to detail and historical accuracy. In 1977 he was elected a member of the Royal Society of Marine Artists. There have been several exhibitions of his work in the U.S.A. The above painting is called 'America' off the Needles 1851. 

Over the years, he has written and illustrated several more books, about aircraft and ships and illustrated books by others. His most recent book is The Art of Roy Cross, published in 2019. The EAGLE Society were delighted to welcome Roy to our Gathering at Portsmouth in 1997, where he spoke to us about his life and work.