Today we take aircraft carriers - and the pilots of the planes that land on them - for granted.

But before 1917, landing a plane on a ship at sea was thought impossible.

That was until the feat was achieved by Essex man Sir Edwin Dunning.

On August 2 that year, Squadron Commander Dunning, whose grave is at Bradfield, near Harwich, landed his Sopwith Pup aircraft on to a platform on the foredeck of the light battle cruiser HMS Furious off Scotland.

He successfully completed a second landing, but was killed while trying it for a third time, on August 7, when his plane crashed into the sea.

Sq.Comm Dunning's family lived at Jacques Hall, beside the River Stour.

A memorial to the pioneer flier is inside the door of St Lawrence's Church, Bradfield.

The 75th anniversary of his death, in 1992, was marked with a memorial service and wreath-laying ceremony in Sq.Comm Dunning's home village.

It was attended by members of the Fleet Air Arm Officers's Association and Sq.Comm Dunning's relatives as well as teenagers from Manningtree Air Training Corps.

A sheltered housing project in Bradfield, built in 1988, is called Dunning Close in his honour.

(Right) St Lawrence's Church, Bradfield, which has a memorial to the flying pioneer

(Left) A Sopwith Camel, the plane flown by Sir Edwin Dunning

(Below right) Jacques Hall, the Dunning family home by the River Stour

Converted for the new archive on 19 November 2001. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.