Why do we hate history so much?

I love history, museums, written history, alive history IE restored cars, aeroplanes, battle re-enactments.  I believe whats written on the tin,  by understanding the past we can learn from it and not make the same mistakes [fingers crossed]

However i feel my view point is firmly in the minority now ill try my best to give some examples to you bear with me.  “Concord” the worlds first super sonic airliner designed as a joint venture between “Air France” and “British airways” it was an absolute marvel, capable of speeds up to mach 2 or 1350mph relative ground speed.  I once had the privilege to sit in the pilots seat of a live commissioned Concord in 1977 at heathrow airport, I had a days pass from my late fathers R.A.F. buddy, i also sat in the pilots seat of a Boeing 747 and a DC10.  The Concord could fly from London to New york in well under 3 hours, rock stars were queuing to fly in this marvel.

Spin the time machine forward over 20 years, British airways and Air France decided they no longer had the inclination or the funds to keep flying Concord, however i have followed Concord’s progress since it was commissioned, it never made money it was run at a loss through out the 70s, 80s and 90s, no matter how much was charged for a one way ticket to New york, approx £2000 in today’s terms or $3,700 it lost money! simple maths is the answer it used allot of Av-gas [jet fuel] for a tiny amount of passengers approx 100.

When the news broke of Concords demise Richard Branson the head and founder of Virgin airways offered to buy 2 aircraft and all the available spare parts, he was resolutely turned down and B.A. announced they would not sell at any price why? the special tooling and spare engines etc were scrapped smashed to pieces and dumped.  The remaining airframes were stripped of engines wiring looms instruments and donated to museums around the world.  British airways were acting like a spoilt child ie “If we cant have them, nor can you so nerr!”

NASA brought the Russian version of Concord nick named “Concordsky” the Russians stole the plans to Concord whilst it was on the drawing board in the 1960s, however their version was noisy extremely heavy on fuel and vibrated to a point that passengers would not fly in it.  NASA wants the airframes for testing and planning the next generation of SSTs [Super-sonic transport] why didn’t British airways sell their fleet to NASA, a better solution if they didn’t want Virgin airways to have them?

Short sightedness and shear childishness in my humble opinion.  Moving on to an older example of disrespect for history.  U504 is or was a German U boat from ww2 it was salvaged in the 90s by a multi millionaire, the interior was stripped of Enigma machines, medals, binoculars etc, but the submarine itself was left intact except for the batteries which went back to the original owners.  Subsequently U 504 was towed in a specially constructed barge all the way to Liverpool in the U.K. no charge! what a generous man.  The U 504 was cleaned and corrosion treated on one side only, a charity maintained it and opened it to the public, i toured it in 2003, what an interesting visit.  Fast forward to 2008 the charity could not afford to keep the submarine it was sold off to a ferry company, the first thing the ferry company did was cut it up into 3 pieces and it now is little more than a child’s toy!

The damage to history is not limited to war relics or aeroplanes, back in my home town of the “London borough of Enfield”we had an “Art deco” cinema a real beautiful building.  Due to multi screen cinemas it was closed and the supermarket chain called “Tesco” had made a bid for the land it stood on, no prizes to guess what they had planned for the site.  Me and thousands of other people wrote to every one we could think of to save this piece of 1930s architecture, once again Richard Branson offered to buy the cinema after we contacted him and guess what they wouldn’t sell it to him!  A deal was struck that Tesco agreed to save the front of the building and construct their supermarket behind the front of the art deco building, what happened next could be seen as slander so please understand its my version of events not fact. At approx 3.00am a JCB [mechanical digger] started its self up, dipped its own clutch pedal engaged first gear then accidentallydrove into the front of the cinema destroying it! now I’m only a humble Vehicle mechanic by trade but a digger to start itself up and ram a building not very likely in my qualified opinion.

It seems the world has got itself in a hurry and through a lack of fore sight and disrespect is ruining our heritage.

Lord Banks