IT’S not every day that an Royal Navy helicopter lands behind the Kelvingrove art galleries and is then towed across the road to the Kelvin Hall, holding up traffic in the process.

This particular helicopter, from Lossiemouth, and its crew, moreover, had recently been involved in the dramatic sea rescue of 41 seamen from the MV Dovrefjell, a Norwegian ore-carrier which had run aground on the Pentland Skerries a month earlier. The operation, directed from the destroyer, HMS Wizard, was carried out in a gale and very rough seas, and was described by a naval spokesman as the biggest single operation of its kind in Admiralty records.

The helicopter, which was greeted by Lord Provost Andrew Hood (pictured) after landing on March 2, 1956, was one of the stars of the show at a careers fair in the Kelvin Hall. The Scottish Schoolboys’ and Girls’ Exhibition was opened by Peter Brough and his dummy, Archie Andrews, stars of the hit BBC radio ventriloquist show, Educating Archie.

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The exhibitors included British Railways, the various Services, the National Coal Board, the Gas Board and the Electricity Board. Among the items on show was a working model of a guided-weapons trial range (‘of particular interest,’ this newspaper reported, ‘in view of the South Uist experiment’); an 18ft bi-fuel experimental rocket; a Centurion tank-turret and 20-pounder gun from the Royal Ordnance factory at Dalmuir; and a copy of a Hawker Hunter RAF jet fighter. Glasgow police demonstrated the detection of criminals by finger-printing,

As for the RN helicopter, intrigued young visitors were able to study its instrument panel.