MERMOZ (Jean)

Lot 417
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Estimation :
7500 - 10000 EUR
MERMOZ (Jean)
Autograph manuscript of the article L'aviation populaire. [October 1936]. 3 p. in-4 (26.8 x 20.9 cm) wove paper, brown ink. Important autograph manuscript, heavily scratched and corrected, of an article published in Le Flambeau, October 10, 1936. The Communist Party, the SFIO and the PSF were then fighting for the control of the flying clubs. In this newspaper of the French Social Party founded by Colonel de La Rocque, Mermoz called for a neutral and apolitical application of the "right to fly for all", especially in favour of the youth: "For too long, the idea of popular aviation should have been born in the minds and should be fully realised today. It should have begun to live and develop, not under a political sign, but under that of a bold understanding of the aspirations of modern youth broadened in a sense of sportsmanship and social education. [...]. Since the creation of the Ministry of Air, no one had been concerned about this until the day when Mr. Marcel Déat, Minister of Air, along with Wibault and Massenet, had the idea of creating a National Council of Young Aircraft where all the major social organizations and youth associations would be represented, without distinction of political nuances. This council was to be responsible for grouping together in a common aeronautical ideal all young people without distinction of class or opinion, for encouraging, advising and assisting all new formations of popular clubs, for distributing equitably the official subsidies of private aviation, hitherto reserved for the single class of people who could afford the luxury of buying and maintaining a tourist aircraft. The aim of the youth aviation movement was to give young people the opportunity to fly with the support of all political parties in a non-partisan way. [...]». This publication precedes by a few months the disappearance of Mermoz in the Atlantic on December 7, 1936. PROVENANCE: Sale Paris, October 11, 2008, lot M111. A few
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