The Royal Air Force Museum American Foundation (RAFMAF) was founded in 2002. The Foundation is a non-profit registered charitable organization which exists to ensure the shared aviation heritage of the USA and the UK is kept alive, and it works to provide funds, and other means, to underpin the RAF Museum’s programs of acquisition, conservation, interpretation, education and training. Since 2009 the RAFMAF’s ‘Spirit of the Battle of Britain’ Banquet has been held annually in Washington D.C. and has become established as one of the premier events in the D.C. aerospace calendar. Held to coincide with the Exchange Officers Conference, the Banquet is attended by senior serving officers of the RAF and USAF, including the Chiefs, representatives from the D.C. Diplomatic Corps and senior executives of the global aerospace industry. Run along the lines of a formal RAF Mess Dinner, the evening features the presentation of Swords of Honour to the two outstanding RAF and USAF exchange officers of the year. The annual banquets celebrate a different aviation or aerospace theme each year and for 2023 the RAFMAF chose to honour the BBMF.
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OC BBMF, Squadron Leader Mark ‘Suggs’ Sugden, was invited to attend the banquet as a speaker, along with former, long-serving BBMF fighter pilot and OC BBMF, Squadron Leader (retired) Paul ‘Major’ Day OBE AFC as the Guest of Honour. ‘Major’ Day acquired his nickname after an exchange tour flying F4s with the USAF where his RAF rank of Squadron Leader was alien to the Americans and he substituted their equivalent of Major. He joined the RAF in 1961 and served for 43 years. During that time, he flew as a fighter pilot with the BBMF for an unprecedented and probably never-to-be-surpassed 24 years. He was OC BBMF for eight years from 1996 to the end of the 2003 display season, achieving over 1,000 hours on Spitfires. It was quite a coup to prise ‘The Major’ out of retirement to attend the event, but he said it was something he said he felt he ought to do.
The RAF Chief of the Air Staff, Air Chief Marshal Sir Richard Knighton, attended the event, along with the USAF acting Chief of Staff, General David W Allvin, as well as many other senior officers, serving and retired, from both air forces. This did not seem to faze ‘The Major’ at all, but ‘Suggs’ said he felt very junior in the presence of so much rank. In the programme for the event, Air Chief Marshal Sir Richard Knighton wrote: “The BBMF has a special place in the subconsciousness of the RAF, as it diligently and passionately seeks to remind us, and the generations to come, that freedom has a price.”
There is no doubt that the profile of the BBMF has once again been raised and its importance highlighted in the consciousness of those present at the event, in the USA in particular, as the spotlight shone on the Flight in Washington D.C.
