Can you shed any light on the relationship between Neon, Bernard and Marion?

The latter being my Great Great Great Great Great Grandfather

Turning again to sucessful flights and projected routes from North Africa to South America, we at once observe the significance of the steady and permanent north-east trade wind. But where can we find the return voyages? In South America, European aircraft will become as indigenous as are European birds reported to become indigenous in the Cape Verde Islands. Flights to and from South Africa follow the route, and to a great extent, the seasons, of the swallows. There is indeed no exception to the rule that aircraft in long flights migrate with the wind and are seldom seen again in the land of their origin if the prevailing wind is from one direction, as in the northern hemisphere it is. Thus all ‘migratory’ aircraft in the northern hemisphere gradually accumulate in the East until they are destroyed from one cause or another, when they are replaced from the ‘breeding grounds’ in the West.

Compare with Neon’s Atlantic Monthly article:

The domination of the wind over aircraft is complete. An aeroplane in the air cannot use the wind. There can be no comparison between the action of wind on a sailing ship and the action of wind – moving air – on an aeroplane flying in it and completely surrounded by it. In the air there can be no ‘trimming of sails,’ no ‘beating to windward,’ for to all the courses of the air and to its full speed the aeroplane unconsciously and completely conforms. A ’sea’ of air envelops it; within this moving ’sea’ the airman unconsciously drives his plane and steers a course. His course over land or sea and his speed ‘made good’ are the resultant of known and unknown factors. Adequate provision can be made for the known factors, and should no engine trouble occur or compass errors develop, and were the ’sea’ in which the airman flies as stationary as the sea or land beneath him, the airman must arrive at his destination and at the prearranged time; were even the movement of the medium known, and could it be relied upon not to alter in rate and direction during the whole journey, the time of safe arrival could be calculated beforehand; but should the aviator’s ’sea’ take some unexpected course during passage, the time of arrival is uncertain—in a long flight the end may never be known. The skill of the pilot cannot ensure success or avert disaster, for the wind is at the helm, imposing upon a craft its own direction and speed.

It’s the same line of argument.

I did find somewhere which suggested that he connected his critique of ‘relativity’ (which is Galilean relativity) with Einstein’s, but I don’t think that was his main target.

What a wonder the human mind is, that it can in all seriousness come up with a sentence like ‘Thus all ‘migratory’ aircraft in the northern hemisphere gradually accumulate in the East until they are destroyed from one cause or another, when they are replaced from the ‘breeding grounds’ in the West’!

But his anti-scientific stance and her scientific education are certainly a curious fit, and invites speculation …

My assumption was that Marion was ‘officially’ associated with Neon in some way, and not just by rumour, partly because of the Casey letter (he had the info ‘confidentially’, and he would have moved in pretty high circles). But maybe it was something like what you suggest — after all, most of the discussion I have is from people sympathetic to the RAF and the Air Ministry (Spaight was a senior civil servant there, though he doesn’t actually suggest Neon was a woman). Wish I knew why the BL so confidently declared that Neon was Marion!

Anyway, glad I could provide some momentary diversions :)

But maybe she sat enthralled at the dining room table listening to the energetic submariner nephew, as her husband was approaching death.

If she had her diploma in 1893, she was born some time around or earlier than 1873. So she was maybe twelve years older than Bernard and probably around sixty at publication. Her husband was older – he was 74.

Assuming that she was not a mature age student and therefore any age short of senility, she could well have relished some kind of entry into a fight that she supported. It was a way out of grief, into a wider immediacy.

We have to wonder why the guess about Marion was considered to be plausible. Surely, in the technocratic culture of London, those who could pick her behind the pseudonym would see past her to the truculent submarining nephew.

There is even a metaphor of concealment in this very idea.

Maybe there was some notion that the argument was denigrated even more completely if it could be pinned on a woman, a recent widow to boot. The Neon name being a primary bit of evidence, of course.

Ah, I do love this superficial crap.

Ah, the fun of trash speculation…