PARTICULARLY in the 1960s and 1970s, the duke made many solo visits to our area, and we can’t list them all, but in the interests of fairness – and because the Echo has an excellent photographic record of the occasion – we should mention that on June 24, 1960, the duke helicoptered in to Darlington’s Eastbourne School.

Darlington as a town had joined up to the awards scheme earlier in the year, and the duke arrived to encourage the first entrants. He spent a couple of hours at the school, and also made it to Neasham, to watch a canoeing exhibition, before flying onward from RAF Middleton St George to his next appointment.