Black box credit is overdue
In 1998, when Ric Bull stumbled by chance into a Mt Lawley antique and junk shop, he immediately recognised a strange looking sphere for sale.
He flashed back to a newspaper article his mother Noreen had cut out of _The West Australian _about Robert Orgill and his black box invention.
"My mother gave me the article and said I might find it interesting," Mr Bull said.
"In 1998 I went to Shambles' 1950s shop in Mt Lawley with a friend who was looking for something else and we saw the sphere sitting in a Tupperware tray."
"I thought there must be thousands of these made, I had no idea there was only a handful. I just thought Orgill was accepted as the inventor of the black box."
Mr Bull said that the sphere was in a trunk of junk delivered by the YMCA. It was the close of a tragic tale, as Mr Orgill committed suicide in 1964 while living at the YMCA.
For now Mr Bull is the proud custodian of a piece of extraordinary aviation history.
"It's a man's lifetime dream I have in my hands," Mr Bull said. "There should be recognition for what Mr Orgill did for aviation."
Geoffrey Thomas
