He helped the legendary Sir Malcolm Campbell on his Daytona dashes and joined the great RJ Mitchell in the creation of the Spitfire fighter. Flashback salutes Herefordian Cyril Lovesey, engineering maestro.

THE gramophone seemed useless and beyond repair, but the Hereford schoolboy's ingenuity with an old boot blacking tin, a needle and solder coaxed it into making music once more. The youngster also rigged up a telephone between his house and a friend's home. How the chums chatted! When the boy became a man the inventiveness flourished. In peacetime his engineering skills enabled Britain to smash sporting records on land and in the skies.

As the country waged war he was not only a courageous combatant but also a boffin whose brilliance helped in the creation of the Spitfire and Hurricane aircraft. His contribution to the war effort led to him being honoured by his king. Cyril Lovesey was the son of a renowned Hereford accountant and grandson of a legendary turn-of-the-century Holmer wheelwright and blacksmith. He inherited lashings of talent from both. Educated at Broomy Hill Academy and Hereford High School for Boys, Lovesey served in the Royal Flying Corps in the First World War and had a number of lucky escapes from death, being shot down several times during bombing operations. At Bristol University he gained a BSc which proved to be a passport into the services of Rolls Royce. He became supremo of its experimental department and enjoyed a glittering career. He collaborated with R J Mitchell to achieve incredible success in times good and bad.

They masterminded Britain's win in the Schneider Trophy in 1929 when the Vickers Supermarine Rolls Royce S.6B monoplane topped 400 mph. A great victory, but only prestige and pride was the prize. Soon, freedom itself would be at stake and they also teamed-up in the experiments that led to the birth of the Spitfire fighter, so supreme in the Battle of Britain. For his stirring contribution towards the war effort he was awarded the OBE in 1946. Herefordians had watched with pride his ever-growing list of achievements and were never more delighted than in the 1930s when he was chief engineer to his good friend, Sir Malcolm Campbell, as the star motorist twice broke the land speed record at Daytona, Florida. Lovesey was such a hands-on operator he would follow behind Campbell's famous 'Bluebird' on its record-breaking runs so that he could examine the engine immediately before the return. The pursuit would be made with Lovesey sitting in the back of a mere saloon car being 'thrown about like a shuttlecock'. He recalled how in 1933 the Rolls Royce engine was in perfect condition, showing no wear and tear from having broken a world record. Indeed, it had been vastly over-revved for there had been terrific wheelspin on loose sand generated by a hurricane at the end of the previous year. While in the United States Lovesey visited most of the major aeroplane and automobile factories and he noticed an absence on the roads of old cars. ''In fact, old cars in America, like the proverbial dead donkey, just aren't,'' he said. After the great Daytona day in 1935 when Lovesey assisted Campbell to lift the land speed record above 300 mph, he returned to Hereford to visit his parents in Belmont Road. He took along with him a memento of the historic occasion. Mr and Mrs Lovesey, senior, were not presented with any Sir Malcolm memorabilia or a bit of 'Bluebird'. Accompanying their son was a native of the very beach where the race against the clock was run -- an 18in. long baby crocodile!