It started off as little more than a hut in a field. But the former Yeadon Aerodrome is now a fully-fledged international airport, serving destinations across the globe.

As the airport celebrates its 75th anniversary, MARK CASCI takes a look back at the history of the airport and the changes that have made it what it is today.

Yeadon Aerodrome officially opened on a 60-acre patch of grassland in 1931.

As early photographs show, it was little more than a runway and a small wooden hut.

Today, the airport boasts 42 check-in desks, a hotel, a food village and a variety of shops.

Passengers jet off to destinations as far away as Acapulco and Barbados and more than two million passengers fly from the airport each year.

Staff have been coming together to commemorate the anniversary with a variety of activities.

Long-serving and prominent members of staff have formed a human chain, spelling out the number 75 and a series of competitions have been organised as they also celebrate national customer service week.

Someone who knows the changes seen at the airport better than most is Carol Clark.

Today she works as a customer services assistant but she first came to be involved there in the 1970s when she was a hostess on board some of the first commercial flights to leave the airport.

She said: "It certainly has changed quite a bit.

"When I started, the commercial flights we did were minimal in comparison to today. Our flights generally went to Dublin, Heathrow, Amsterdam and Jersey.

"Most of the flights I was involved with as a member of the cabin crew were to take business people around on chartered flights.

"We flew the Black Dyke band down to Cornwall for a concert and spent the weekend there which was nice.

"I remember taking the Leeds United squad around for matches on chartered flights too.

"The biggest change I have seen since working there is the rise of Jet2.com, just in terms of the amount of destinations people can now fly to from the airport." Unlike the major international airport it is today, Yeadon Aerodrome started out life as home to a flying club, which used Cirrus and Gypsy Moth aircraft for training and Leopard Moth crafts for short chartered flights.

Over the next four years the site extended by a further 35 acres and the first terminal was built at a cost of £40,000, a far cry from the multi-million pound one that exists today.

The Royal Auxiliary Air Force was later formed at the airport and civil flights regularly operated to and from Newcastle, Edinburgh and the Isle of Man.

However, as of September 3, 1939, all civil aviation was grounded as World War II broke out.

The airport's use changed enormously as it became a test centre for the thousands of new aircraft which were built to assist with the war effort.

To accommodate the test flights of the Anson, Lancaster, York and Lincoln aircraft, a vast programme of building work was undertaken.

Two new runways, a taxiway and flight test centre were all built at the airport and the first Lancaster bomber.

More importantly, the vast Avro factory was also constructed on the site to manufacture the planes needed for the war.

At its height, the Avro factory covered a total of 1.5 million square feet and employed 17,500 people, a staggering total considering the population of Yeadon at the time was only 10,000.

Before production was halted in 1946, a total of 5,000 aircraft, including 695 Lancaster Bombers, were produced at the factory.

It was not until 1947 that the Ministry of Aircraft Production returned the use of the airfield to civil use.

Air transport services between Belfast, Dusseldorf and Jersey regularly flew out and HM Customs facilities were introduced there in 1956.

In 1959, the airport that is known today began to take shape when the Yeadon Aerodrome title was dropped in favour of Leeds-Bradford Airport.

A joint committee took over the official running of the airport and a restaurant, bar and car park were added to the site. By the end of year, nearly 50,000 passengers had passed through the terminal.

In May, 1965, the terminal building was badly damaged in a fire and a new one was constructed, opening in 1968.

By 1974 a daily London service was being used and more than 283,000 passengers were using the airport.

The first holiday service to Palma departed on the Britannia Airways Boeing 737-200 aircraft.

The next big phase of construction work began in 1982.

The £23 million scheme to extend the runway and improve transport links were begun, including the now-famous tunnel under the runway through which the A658 Bradford to Harrogate road runs.

Two years later the dramatically-expanded airport saw its first transatlantic flight to Toronto depart.

The airport hit the headlines for the wrong reasons in May, 1985, when a British Airtours Tristar jet carrying 416 passengers careered off the end of the runway and came to rest just yards away from an embankment.

Fortunately no one was killed in the crash but a lengthy investigation was launched into its cause.

Among the passengers were members of the Lincoln City football club squad who had been on holiday to Majorca to try to forget the horrors of the Bradford City fire disaster which they had witnessed at Valley Parade.

There was better news in 1986 when Air France's Concorde landed at the airport and passenger numbers soared past the half million mark.

In 1987 the airport was formed into a private limited company, with Bradford Council, along with local authorities in Leeds, Wakefield, Calderdale and Kirklees all becoming the sole shareholders.

By 1996 the terminal was handling one million passengers each year and a new £2.5 million restoration programme was underway.

It was here that the airport's distinctive "airbridge" was built, connecting the terminal to the aircraft.

Low cost airline Jet2.com began flying from the airport in 2002 and within a year it had carried 360,000 passengers to destinations across Europe.

Ed Anderson, managing director of Leeds-Bradford Airport, said: "Leeds-Bradford International Airport is now unrecognisable from the original, modest establishment that opened 75 years ago and early aviators would be astonished at its growth.

"More than 70 destinations are available on direct services with both business and leisure passengers taking advantage of the many scheduled, domestic, international and "low cost" flights that are now a part of every day life."

e-mail: mark.casci@bradford.newsquest.co.uk