Geoffrey Rothe Clarke

[7] Clarke was the third of five children; his older sister Letitia Marion Dallas (alias Miss Darragh) became a well-known stage actress in Dublin, Manchester and London,[8] while his younger brother Reginald joined the Indian Police in 1900, rising to become Chief Commissioner of Calcutta and receiving a knighthood in 1922.

In February 1911, he authorised the world's first official aerial post, flying 6500 mail items five miles from Allahabad across the confluence of the Ganges and Yamuna rivers to Naini railway junction for onward transit.

A surcharge of six Annas per item raised charitable funds in aid of Holy Trinity Church Allahabad constructing a hostel for Indian students.

Clarke was recalled to London in 1916 to serve under David Lloyd George in the Ministry of Munitions in order to advise on overcoming the weapons supply crisis in Britain during World War I.

[10] He was sent on a special deputation to the United States and Canada to negotiate procurement contracts, and was made an Officer of the Order of the British Empire in 1918 for this service.

For employees, no distinction of race was made in promotion or pay, such that by the end of his tenure, most higher appointments in the Post Office were held by Indian nationals, including his successor, GP Roy.

[18] Although the firm had just received a large order to manufacture and lay a new 3500 nautical mile telegraph cable under the Pacific Ocean, its future was challenged by competition from short-wave radio and the economic depression of the early 1930s.

[10] With his background knowledge of underwater cabling manufacture, Clarke become a member of a British government committee charged with solving the problem of supplying the advancing Allied forces with petrol, while avoiding enemy attack and adverse weather.

In great secrecy, the committee coordinated the design and manufacture of several hundred miles of flexible pressure resistant piping, through which petrol could be pumped and transported across the English Channel.

[25] Clarke subsequently commissioned a stained glass window at St. Michael's church, Llan Ffestiniog, Wales, to remember the women and children killed during World War II.