Product Information for Air Ministry Solid Oak Desk

SOLD  Old Air Ministry oak desk with two side drawers. This is a very solid desk, with generous high quality solid oak, which would be ideal for a small workspace. We believe the desk would have been used by Air Ministry personnel at one of their premises. The desk has been stamped with an Air Misistry stamp and is dated dated: 1937.

Oak desk size: L107cm x W68cm x H77cm (42 X 27 X 30)

The Air Ministry was created in January 1918 to oversee the birth in April 1918 of the Royal Air Force from the amalgamation of the Royal Flying Corps and the Royal Naval Air Service. The organisation was broadly similar to that of the Admiralty and the War Office, with a Secretary of State chairing the Air Council and the senior RAF member holding the post of Chief of the Air Staff. In 1919 the Air Ministry moved to Adastral House, then in Kingsway. In 1952 the central part of the Air Ministry moved to the new building in Whitehall Gardens that was later to become the Main Building of the Ministry of Defence.

The supply of military aircraft, which had been the responsibility of the Air Ministry, was transferred in 1940 to a new Ministry of Aircraft Production, which in 1946 was amalgamated with the Ministry of Supply. In further reorganisations the task was switched to the Ministry of Aviation in 1959, to the Ministry of Technology in 1967 and finally to the Ministry of Aviation Supply in 1970. In 1971 the Government called on Mr Derek Rayner to advise on its relations with the aviation industry. One of his principal recommendations was the transfer to the MOD of the military aviation task, to be undertaken by a separate organisation within the MOD, which would also assume the responsibility for all other military procurement.