AVIATION history, like all history, is the story of winners who were good at self-promotion.

Thus it was that we know about the Wright brothers and their first flight at Kitty Hawk on December 17, 1903, although some six months before that a young Englishman called Richard Pearse flew further and longer in New Zealand.

The first official piloted heavier-than-air flight in these islands took place in Hampshire in October 1908 and just under a year later the well-connected Barnwell brothers, who were born in London, launched Scotland’s first successful aeroplane in the shadow of the Wallace Memorial in Stirling – although they only managed to stay airborne for 80 yards. Both went on to make distinguished contributions to the development of aviation.

Impressive as such achievements are, however, they are put a little in the shade by a very different pioneer, whose first all-Scottish heavier-than-air flight on September 11, 1910, was being celebrated on the Island of Bute last weekend and whose example is being used to inspire a new generation of innovators.

Andrew Blain Baird was a blacksmith in Rothesay. Originally from Galloway, he had worked as a lighthouse keeper on Lismore as well as in a steelworks before settling on Bute. He had an inventive mind, as demonstrated by his improvements to a variety of agricultural implements and sometime before the UK’s first official air show, held in Blackpool in October 1909, he became interested in aviation.

He went to Blackpool, meeting a number of the early pilots, and came back with the idea for an aircraft of his own, which he proceeded to build over the winter and into the spring.

It was constructed in the old Drill Hall in Rothesay, now a carpet warehouse, and although Baird bought the engine in Edinburgh, the rest was fabricated by him and his wife, who sowed silk for the wings.

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In July 1910, he exhibited the plane in the Esplanade Gardens in Rothesay before it was taken to the Bute Highland Games on August 20.

Three weeks later it was attached to a horse and cart and towed to Ettrick Bay, a sandy beach on the west of the island which Baird had chosen for his first flight.

That was, however, very short. Reporting the attempt, Flight Magazine commented that “on clearing the ground, the swerving influence of the axle ceased and the influence of the steering wheel brought the machine sharply round to the right, causing it to swoop to the ground.”

And that was it. Baird, as far as we know, made no attempt to fly again and the aircraft was broken up. The engine stayed in his smithy until it was demolished almost half a century later. The propeller was bought by a local bank manager and eventually donated to the Museum of Flight.

We will never know what motivated Baird, though distraction from the death of his two young daughters in the scarlet fever epidemic of 1909 may have been one reason.

Nor will we know why he flew only once. What did last, however, was his example and it was that which attracted Chris Markwell, a retired Canadian banker who was born on Bute and who spends part of each year there, to organise a centenary commemoration in 2010 and then to go on to develop and lead a most remarkable charitable society using Baird as a model for emulation by young people.

A week ago, the Baird of Bute Society held its first series of events since 2019, and this included the by-now-legendary annual dinner at which awards are given for distinguished contributions by Scots men and women to science, innovation and aviation.

The stellar list of those who have made it to the renamed Baird of Bute function suite in the Victoria Hotel in Rothesay is as remarkable as Baird’s own achievement.

This year the Nobel Prize winner Sir David MacMillan, (originally from Belshill) rubbed shoulders with his fellow Baird laureate David Mackay (originally from Sutherland), Virgin Galactic’s chief pilot and the first Scot in space.

Kilmarnock Academy and Glasgow University graduate Sir Stephen Hillier, former head of the RAF and now chair of the Civil Aviation Authority, was there as patron of the society along with – among others – Craig Clark, founder of Clyde Space; cancer researcher Professor Patrick Gunning; Sir Ian Gray, director of aerospace at Cranfield University; and Dugald Cameron, former director of the Glasgow School of Art and design engineer and aviation artist.

The society’s vice-chair, Edinburgh University chemistry professor Eleanor Campbell (herself from Bute) brought a group of students who the following day set up a series of fun experiments to encourage young people’s interest in science.

Free kites were also handed out and flown around the memorial to Baird and then, in conclusion, the small planes which had earlier flown into the island’s grass airstrip (also now named after Baird) flew over Ettrick Bay in tribute. But that is not all. Chris and his wife Hazel have, from the beginning, been determined to ensure that the example of Baird, and those Scots who have come after him as key figures in the science and aviation fields, inspire others to great things.

That is why the society has offered a young person’s scholarship for a number of years. Those selected gain experience of world-quality science being done in world-quality labs while a wider programme has put information about Baird, the society and those it honours into schools.

That part of the society now needs to raise funds to continue and expand its much-appreciated work.

It is exciting to see an extraordinary story like that of Baird revived in order to improve the prospects for young people, their communities and their country. Yet in order to do that we need to support not just the unsung heroes of our past but also determined contemporary visionaries such as Chris Markwell.