Cataloguing the past of British Airways

"A dream of effortless flight"

One of the collections we hold relates to the UK advertising agency Foote, Cone & Belding (FCB) and was rescued by HAT from their London offices during re-organisation in the late 1990s. We are currently working on a project to catalogue the collection in detail and this work has uncovered many interesting records. One of the most colourful and substantial series of archives relates to British Airways and its former incarnation BOAC. Once complete the FCB material will be searchable via our online catalogue making an invaluable historical resource freely accessible to anyone with a passion for learning about the past.

FCB is one of the oldest advertising agencies still operating today. It was founded by Daniel Lord and Ambrose Thomas as Lord & Thomas in Chicago, USA in 1873. In 1942 Lord & Thomas was sold to Emerson H. Foote, Fairfax Cone and Don Belding to become Foote Cone & Belding. FCB’s London office was set up in 1947 in a converted house under its first manager Brian MacCabe. The business obviously grew quickly as they soon moved to larger premises in Hill Street, moving again in 1959 to a property in Baker Street. As one of UK FCB’s first major clients a big reason for this success was winning the account for BOAC (British Overseas Airways Corporation) the national airline created in 1939 by the merger of Imperial Airways and British Airways Ltd. In 1949 BOAC absorbed BSAA (British South American Airways) and then finally merged with BEA (British European Airways) in 1974 to form what we know today as British Airways (BA).

The FCB archive collection we hold is made up of a substantial number of large bound volumes known as guard books. It was common practice in the advertising industry to maintain a hard copy record of all published print advertisements charting the agency’s output. Unsurprisingly considering their prominence as a client, over 100 volumes of the FCB guard books relate to the airline British Airways and its predecessors, dating from 1946 to 1979. The material within the volumes doesn’t just include print adverts but also various designed items such as branded stationary, certificates, Christmas cards, postcards, menus, calendars, timetables, safety information and even playing card packs.

The partnership between the airline and FCB was a fruitful one and coincided with a golden era for both companies. It also saw some of the most famous and iconic advertising campaigns emerge, incorporating slogans such as The Skyline of Fashion which played on the glamour of early aviation, It’s a small world by Speedbird which highlighted the many exotic destinations the airline brought into reach and All over the world BOAC takes good care of you. This last slogan was the longest running and exemplified the airlines focus on customer care and comfort. It was later updated to We'll take more care of you for the patriotic 1970’s Fly the flag campaign featuring the inviting, smiling face of real life air stewardess Roz Hanby. FCB also helped to trumpet the innovations in air travel which BOAC and later BA were at the forefront of, such as the first passenger jet, the Comet advertised as a dream of effortless flight come true and the VC10 described as triumphantly swift, silent, serene. Adverts for the double decked transatlantic Boeing Stratocruisers encouraged passengers to choose the Monarch for extra luxury, incomparable cuisine, impeccable service. After the arrival of the Boeing 747 they assured us that East, West our Jumbos are best and after the launch of the iconic British Airways Concorde promised to make the world a small place.

Mark Pitchforth

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