John Longmuir Penman Brodie
John Longmuir Penman Brodie (1899-1959), director of De Havilland
1899 June 1st. Born
1959 Obituary [1]
WE regret to record the death of Mr. J. L. P. Brodie, F.R.Ae.S., on Monday last.
John Longmuir Penman Brodie was born at Dumfries in 1899. He was apprenticed to Arrol-Johnston, Ltd., one of the very few Scottish automobile manufacturers.
During the 1914-18 war he worked on the design of the Beardmore-Halford-Pullinger engine and this contact with Frank Halford led to his joining Halford in his work as a consultant designer. Halford and Brodie together developed further the "Puma" and the aircooled V-8 Renault, designed the "Gipsy" engine for manufacture by de Havilland, and originated the air-cooled Napier "Rapier" and "Dagger" that led Halford finally to the horizontally-opposed sleeve-valve "Sabre."
Meanwhile Brodie had, in 1940, taken over the administration of the de Havilland department reconditioning Rolls-Royce "Merlin" engines, and subsequently assumed the engineering management of the de Havilland engine and propeller divisions. This led to work on both centrifugal and axial turbo-jets, on hydrogen-peroxide rockets, and finally on the licence built General Electric T-58 of extreme specific output.
At his death he was a director of the de Havilland Engine Company, Ltd.