Beedle and Spiers

History

In 1902 William Joseph Beedle built an (unsuccesfull) airship and got a British patent for a steerable propeller in airships in 1903. It is noted in Dirigible magazine [3] that "Captain William Beedle was born June 24th 1886 at Mowbray, Cape Town, in South Africa. By the early 1900s he lived in London . . .". This author considers this most unlikely; more probably, the William Joseph Beedle in question was the father of the aforementioned, who had the same name and who, according to Beedle Jnr's death certificate in 1927, was living in Bushey, Hertfordshire. Quite possibly Beedle Snr lived in South Africa previously, and earned the rank Captain.

As Beedle was not able to achieve anything with his airship, owing probably to the smallness of the envelope and 'an insufficiency of funds'. Beedle contined as an inventor and applied between 1901 and 1920 for nine patents in all - four of them were abandoned - for screw and marine propellers, aeroplane wings, aeroplanes and an airship. In January 1910, Beedle registered the Beedle Propeller and Aeroplane Co Ltd., at Watford.

Wallace Batty Spiers (Wallace Batty Wallace-Spiers after September 1913), was born on 4 December 1867 in St. Pancras, London, the son of James Joseph Spiers and Catherine Susan Spiers (neé Neale). He was director of Wallace Spiers and Co. Ltd., Coal and Coke Merchants.

Together, Beedle and Spiers were reported as testing a hydroplane at Spiers home in Garston, near Watford, Hertfordshire in 1913. Nothing more was heard.

William Beedle died on 4 October 1931 in Watford, Hertfordshire, and Wallace Batty Wallace-Spiers on 14 September 1944 in Kent.

Company References

1. British Aircraft Before The Great War, Michael H. Goodall and Albert E. Tagg (Schiffer Publishing Ltd., 2001)
2. http://www.ancestry.com/
3. Dirigible Number 84 – Summer 2018