[5] In December 1915, Beddington Aerodrome was established – one of a number of small airfields around London that were created for protection against Zeppelin airship raids during the First World War.

After the end of the First World War the aerodrome became an important training airfield for the newly formed Royal Air Force.

[9] The aerodrome stimulated a growth in regular scheduled flights carrying passengers, mail and freight, the first destinations being Paris,[8] Amsterdam and Rotterdam.

[14] The "aerodrome control tower", 15 ft (4.6 m) high with windows on all four sides, was commissioned on 25 February 1920 and provided basic traffic, weather and location information to pilots.

Following the Imperial Airways de Havilland DH.34 crash of December 1924, Britain's first major civil aviation accident, conditions at Croydon came under criticism from the public inquiry that investigated the causes.

Croydon was where regular international passenger services began, initially using converted wartime bombers, and the Croydon–Le Bourget route soon became the busiest in the world.

On the morning of 11 July 1936, Major Hugh Pollard, and Cecil Bebb left Croydon Airport for the Canary Islands in a de Havilland Dragon Rapide aircraft, where they picked up General Francisco Franco, taking him to Spanish Morocco and thereby helping to trigger the outbreak of the Spanish Civil War.

[22] When the Second World War started in September 1939, Croydon Airport was closed to civil aviation but played a vital role as a fighter station during the Battle of Britain.

92 Squadron flew Supermarine Spitfires from RAF Croydon during the early part of the Second World War and the Battle of Britain.

[27][better source needed] Following the end of the war, it was realised that post-war airliners and cargo aircraft would be larger and that air traffic would intensify.

The urban spread of south London and the growth of surrounding villages had enclosed Croydon Airport and left it little room for expansion.

Northolt opened to the airlines soon after that, cutting Croydon's traffic, but the September 1946 ABC Guide shows 218 departures a week to Belfast, Dublin, Liverpool, Manchester, Glasgow (Renfrew), Jersey, Guernsey, and several continental airports.

[28] On 27 September 2009, to mark the 50th anniversary of the closing of the airport, eleven light aircraft, including eight biplanes, staged a flypast.

[28] A de Havilland Heron (a small propeller-driven British airliner of the 1950s) is displayed on the forecourt outside Airport House, mounted on struts.

The Heron is painted to represent an example registered G-AOXL of Morton Air Services, the aircraft that flew the last passenger flight from Croydon on 30 September 1959.

Although Croydon has long ceased operation, the two cut ends of Plough Lane have never been reunited, but the area between has been developed instead into parkland, playing fields, and the Roundshaw residential estate with its roads aptly named after aviators and aircraft.

[29] The area is used primarily by walkers, model aircraft enthusiasts, locals playing football and the Croydon Pirates baseball team.

The church on the Roundshaw estate has a cross on its outside wall that was made from the cut down propeller of a Spitfire based at Croydon during the Second World War.

[30][31] The Aerodrome Hotel and the terminal building including its grand booking hall were built in the neo-classical geometrical design typical of the early 20th century.

[56] It is also mentioned in Evelyn Waugh's Labels: A Mediterranean Journey (1930), Elizabeth Bowen's To the North (1932) and Winston Churchill's Thoughts and Adventures (1932).

W. H. Auden, in his Letter to Lord Byron (1937), lists "Croydon Aerodrome" as one of the locations visited by a modern-day Don Juan.