Charles E . Brown ( photographer ) Charles E . Brown ( 20 January 1896 , Wimbledon , London - 9 October 1982 , Storrington , West Sussex , UK ) was a commercial aviation photographer working for United Kingdom newspapers , the aviation industry and a freelance commercial photographer with official accreditation as a war correspondent . His aviation archive of 30 , 000 images has been preserved at the RAF Museum , Hendon since 1978 . Biography . Born in 1896 , his father Edward James Brown was a butcher with premises situated in Arthur Road , Wimbledon . For his 14th birthday he was give a small camera and in 1911 captured am image of a Balloon landing in Southfields , London . The photography of an Edwardian gentleman balloonist in trouble was published in the Daily Mirror and the newspaper paid Charles Brown a fee of a half - guinea . The art - editor of the Daily Mirror , Hannen Swaffer asked Charles Brown to consider a career in newspaper photography when he left school and he joined aged 16 to learn how to develop film and print photographs in the in - house Daily Mirror darkrooms under the guidance of Bernard Alferi . War Service . In 1915 Charles Brown applied for a posting to the Photographic Section of the Royal Naval Air Service and was turned down . After continuing to work on photographic assignments for the Daily Mirror in the United Kingdom , he was eventually drafted to the 532nd Agricultural Depot , Royal Engineers as a medical orderly based at Wrexham , Wales . After passing a trade test in photography with the Royal Engineers on the 10th August 1918 , further work photographic occurred with the Royal Air Force at their official London Photographic Centre . Leaving military service on the 17th January 1919 and rejoining his pre - war colleagues at the Daily Mirror newspaper . Freelance Photographer . After former Daily Mirror staff had left in the post - war period to establish a press agency , Charles Brown also left the Daily Mirror and established his own freelance press photography business . Specialising in travel , including promotional materials and media , he also specialised in railway photograph and in 1924 a snapshot of a boy talking talking to a driver of a Southern Railway King Arthur class locomotive on platform 4 of Waterloo Station the photograph was used in railway posters for the next 10 years with the slogan ' " South for Sunshine " ' After the success of the Southern Railway poster , this allowed Charles Brown to expand and diversify his freelance press business to included the developing aviation in the 1920s and 1930s . Accepting photographic commissions from major aircraft manufactures from Fairey Aviation Company , de Havilland and Supermarine to help these companies market new aircraft . This was followed by commissions from the Air Ministry and the Admiralty for the Fleet Air Arm . This allowed him to photograph many Royal Air Force air displays and RAF stations . In 1940 his business premises in Fleet Street , London were bombed during The Blitz shattering many glass negatives . Work during wartime included commissions for " Aeronautics " magazine . A wartime commission for " Flying " magazine in the United States included a rare supply of Kodachrome and Ektachrome film .