First ATC Squadron

Seem to recall thst the first Squadron was 1F (Leicester), but happy to be proved wrong by my fellow ACC’ers…

Well 1F is currently City of Leicster Sqn so I would say there’s a good chance that was the first.

I did hear an old tale that the second squadron brought into the ATC was 51 (also in Leicster at the time) but I never had it substantied to me and currently 51 is Orton Sqn (about an hour away) so not sure if it has any reality to it. I believe the reasoning as explained to me was that they didn’t want to give out two F numbers to the same City.

As for that check of how many F squadrons remain. You could certainly use the cadet website to check each number with an F up to 50. Although some Sqns have lost thier F designation due to a disbanded and reforming sitation (3 Sqn is an early example of this).

I believe the original 51 Sqn closed & number reassigned.

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I think the OP has a more nuanced request.

On 4 Feb 1941 there were ADCC sqns & RAF sections from the OTC plus a few non-aligned. The majority of these then became ATC sqns for the rest of the War after which the OTC RAF sections reverted back.

The question is, which was the first non- ADCC or OTC to be created in the ATC so in theory founded 6th Feb or later.

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It’s always struck me as odd how we have many sqns that pre-date the ATC itself but somehow aren’t considered founder sqns. The 50 cap should’ve been lifted a long time ago and all sqns formed before the ATC recognised as founders.

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Only ADCC sqns were eligible for founder status and not all air cadet units were. Some “town” units were sponsored by their OTCs. It’s also why some sqns don’t do ATC Sunday.

Digging out the old ACP31-5 it appears/infers that despite what has been mythologised in the ATC there was an established air cadet program in the 1930s before chamier.

This is one of the reasons on the difference in cap badge.

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Very interesting.

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The whole concept of founders was far more nuanced than just “predating the ATC” it was given out at the very beginning for a purpose so to change that now wouldn’t be the right thing to do.

As above; it’s 210 (Newport) Sqn. And they were formed on 5/2/41.

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That’s not the meaning of the word founder though, is it? And the original reason, to encourage sqns to sign up without delay, is no longer relevant.

By that logic every Squadron that existed before the ACO became the RAFAC is a founder purely because they existed before the rebrand.

All 209 of them! :wink:

By definition they’re founding members of RAFAC but not the ATC. Sqn number plates relate to the ATC, so I’m talking about sqns in existence on or before 5 Feb. ‘41.

Call them what you want, but they shouldn’t get an F as that’s not what an F denotes.

What the Fs denote is arbitrary nonsense. Any ADCC sqn that transferred to the ATC was a founding member.

Which is all well and good, but the F indicates being a founding member of the ADCC not the ATC. It’s a decision and a history that predates the ATC.

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Oh! I take it all back.

I thought it was the first 50 ADCC sqns to transfer over to the ATC: hence my comments about it being arbitrary. If it’s the founding sqns of the ADCC then that’s entirely legit.

When I joined the ATC as a cadet in 1981, my staff cadet instructor (old-skool staff cadet classification) told us in the ‘History of the ATC’ lesson that the F suffix after the squadron number stood for another word beginning with the letter f, in its plural personal pronoun form. :roll_eyes:

I presume he didn’t think much of our nearest Founder Squadron, which was 40F (Chatham) Sqn ATC in Kent Wing: maybe those squadrons took their founder status a bit too seriously for him. :thinking:

I was teaching that lesson the other evening, but I could find only one interpretation of the F suffix in the Notes for Instructors: that piece of ATC history obviously is staying where it belongs back in the 20th Century. :crazy_face:

We were donated a bunch of air cadet news magazines dating back to day dot… i’ll have a look at them next time i’m at sqn and see what i can find!

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My unit was formed (or at least had their first parade night) on 24th March 1941 (I found their advert in the local paper archive).

So clearly there were a lot of towns quicker off the mark than mine.