In the Autumn of 1952 school leavers were deciding what to do. At that time the Civil Service offered Student Apprenticeships to would-be engineers with entrance by nation-wide written examinations taken in January. When the results were published, Richard was 30th of the 450 applicants for about 100 places at various locations including RAE Farnborough.

This was followed by interview in London to establish whether the candidates had a genuine interest in Engineering. After interview, which also eliminated some, he had moved up to 22nd place overall. There were 30 places available at the RAE and he was now in 9th position of those who had put this location down as their number one choice.

There were 23 in our group, all coming from different schools and from different parts of the UK. However there was one unexpected problem - we had 6 Richards and 5 Michaels, so we needed a way of distinguishing them. We had Richard, Dick, and Richie as obvious alternatives but finding 6 different "handles" was not so easy. The first process in the RAE's own college, was to bring everyone up to a common standard. Our lessons took the usual format - about an hour's teaching and worked examples, followed by the class working out further problems.

One day a maths problem was causing everyone particular difficulty and nobody seemed to be able to reach the required formula. After a while, Richard, who normally sat in the second row, piped up to say that he had managed it and quickly a few looked over to check his work - It was indeed correct. Richie Neeve looked on in utter amazement and said quietly to him; "You're a 'Genius'" and immediately emphasised this by turning to the rows behind and pointing to him exclaiming "He's a GENIUS". That was another of the "Richards" sorted out and he was only known by that name from that time on. He also solved one of the Mike problems by adopting the first half of my double-barrelled surname and declared me as "Mollart" soon shortened to "Moll" which is how I was known from then on.

At the end of our first year some of us had saved enough to buy our first motor-cycle. Richard had a trials bike for negotiating difficult terrain. In each difficult section observers checked that you had to passed through without stopping and also had not incurred penalties by putting a foot down to stay on. A have brought a photo of him in action which was published in a National magazine at the time. The machine I had bought had been used for scrambling, so when the time came to take my Driving Test round the streets of Aldershot, Richard kindly suggested I should use his new James 198 machine, as this might go down better with the examiner than mine with its swept up exhaust. However - that ruse did not work - "Undue consideration for others using the road" was the verdict in my first test.

Many evenings in the following summer, we both rode out to various army sites, to Hungry Hill at Farnham and the Pirbright tank-testing grounds where we challenged each other to perform various manoevres before returning to his home at 12 Boxalls Lane for a cuppa.

Almost all in our group lived in the Hostel adjoining the RAE - a disused RAF quarters. Richard lived at home in Aldershot however and could easily have missed out on the advantages of living away from home but instead he integrated fully in the group activities based around the hostel, such as preparing for Rag Week and joining in whatever evening excursions and activities had been arranged including the circuits of the army assault courses and speed trials at the nearby "sprint track".

Three subjects were required for HNC but we were faced with 13 in our blocks of half a term of full-time study - the other half term being spent in the workshops and departments in practical training inside the RAE. Laboratory experiments were coming at us thick and fast in our 4th year and Richie Neeve, Genius and myself developed what we thought was a good way to cope with it. We formed what we called a "Syndicate" which meant taking it in turns to be manager whose responsibility it was to copy the work sheet and record all the equipment, the other two would connect up the circuits and take readings while one of them plotted any graphs needed - repeating any readings which appeared spurious. We then discussed our findings and conclusions and the manager would write the whole thing up and pass it round for us to produce our own version. We all had the sense to put the conclusions in our own words but on one occasion it did not work. One of our lecturers decided to divide our mark of 9 out of ten he had awarded by 3 and give us all our fair share of just 3 each!

At the end of 5 years, we all left Farnborough. Richard remained in the Civil Service and had a number of appointments including a break for the deferred two-year spell of National Service in 1959 finishing in Kenya in June 1962. After re-joining his post at Radway Green where he met Jean before his next promotion and a move to Staffordshire.

The Ex-RAE Apprentices Association meet for a reunion every 5 years and Richard always joined us in the Prince's Hall in Aldershot on these occasions, when about 15 of our group usually attended. To mark our 50th anniversary, all but one of our group were contacted from as far afield as Portugal, Provence, Tasmania, New Zealand, Australia, Guernsey, Canada, and Scotland . Most of them returned to what was in our days "The Queen's Hotel" for our Golden get-together. Unfortunately Richard and Jean had to miss that one due to an important previous dancing commitment but they attended the next one held at the Farnborough RAE Museum for others who could not make the 50th.

"Genius" ….. The Class of '53 will always remember you with much affection and respect.

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Mike M-Rogerson

19th June 2008