Hello Visitor,

Welcome to the November edition of the CAHS National Newsletter.

 CAHS National News

The Canadian Aviation Historical Society (CAHS) will be holding its 52nd National Convention and Annual General Meeting in Hamilton, Ontario, on 17-21 June 2015 at the Courtyard Marriott Hotel. The theme of the convention is "Celebrating Canada's Aviation Industry," and sessions will explore the rich history of Canada's civilian and military aerospace industry. Our team is preparing the convention program which will be open to everyone – university students, professionals in aviation or heritage industries, historians and aviation enthusiasts of every kind. A formal open Call for Papers/Presentations will be sent out in late 2014/early 2015. Check the CAHS website for further information about the convention that will be coming in the months ahead.

 CAHS Online

Special Book Offer - Polar Winds: A Century of Flying the North

The CAHS will receive all proceeds from the sale of Polar Winds copies bought through the CAHS website; this will help the society carry on its important work preserving Canada's aviation history. Polar Winds is $40 (taxes and shipping included - Canada and US orders only), and you will also receive a free e-copy (PDF) of For the Love of Flying: The Story of Laurentian Air Services (Robin Brass Studio, 2009) with each Polar Winds purchase. Click here to purchase a copy. 

* Order deadline is December 14th in order to have in time for Christmas. If you would like a personalized bookplate from Danielle included with your purchase, the order deadline is November 28th. Click here for more details.

"With Polar Winds: A Century of Flying the North, Danielle Metcalfe-Chenail brings us an extraordinarily intimate, engaging and all-encompassing chronicle of Canadian flight north of the 60th parallel. Metcalfe-Chenail proves herself a remarkable historian and writer, weaving factual accounts with compelling stories of risk, heroism and adventure. Brimming with amazing archival photographs and gripping detail acquired through meticulous research and personal interviews, Polar Winds is a definitive and important addition to the canon of Canadian aviation history. An astonishing accomplishment." Carol Shaben, bestselling author of Into the Abyss.

Danielle Metcalfe-Chenail is the author of two books of aviation history including For the Love of Flying (2009) and Polar Winds. She is former president, VP and board member of the CAHS and continues to be an active volunteer, managing its social media accounts. Danielle recently won an Elsie MacGill Foundation Northern Lights Award for women in aviation (rising star category) and is serving as Edmonton's Historian Laureate until 2016. To visit Danielle's website and view all of the book tour dates, click here.

 Early Reader Reviews

	Danielle with Bob McDonald, host of CBC's Quirks and Quarks at LitFest in Edmonton

"I give your book a 10 out 10 and it is a recommended read." Ernest Bastide

"As a social history buff, I enjoy reading about real people and their lives. I've travelled in the Arctic by plane to remote communities like Grise Fiord and Little Cornwallis Island during the short summer months. I know firsthand how vital aviation is to the survival of these communities of families. Polar Winds captures many stories of Arctic aviators, community challenges, rescue, death and everything in between. With her clear, compelling writing and meticulous details, Danielle Metcalfe-Chenail opens the far north in all its beauty and danger. It's a great read!"

 CAHS Chapter News

 In the News

Mynarski Unveiled: Honouring a Wartime Hero

By Bill Zuk

Since December 2005, a group of community-minded individuals in Winnipeg have undertaken to create a "Mynarski Statue Project" whose ultimate goal is to have a memorial commemorating one of Winnipeg's own.

On June 13, 1944, over France, with his Avro Lancaster bomber on fire, Air Gunner Andrew "Andy" Charles Mynarski desperately tried to free a trapped comrade in the jammed tail-gun turret. For precious moments, he struggled with the turret doors while the fire that consumed his clothes and parachute sealed the fate of the bomber and its crew. His selfless act won him the Victoria Cross, Canada and the Commonwealth's highest tribute.

In recognizing the wartime valour of Andrew Mynarski, in many ways, our city, province and country will also be honouring all the brave men and women who served in Bomber Command during the Second World War. After a successful fund-raising campaign, the Mynarski Statue Project commissioned Charlie Johnston, a local artist, to create a bronze statue, posed in a dramatic and fitting pose of the airman reaching out to help his friend. The statue, after casting at an art foundry, has recently come home, fulfilling the "Bringing Andrew Home" campaign. Please join us at the unveiling of this monument.

As a registered charitable organization in support of this project, the Air Cadet League of Canada (Manitoba Inc.) continues to welcome all donations and sponsorship support to further this cause.

The Mynarski Statue is tentatively scheduled for a public dedication on June 12, 2015 at the Vimy Ridge Memorial Park, Winnipeg.

Thoughts of Remembrance

By John Chalmers, CAHS Membership Secretary

Usually, I write about aviation and aviators, but it was the grave of a young soldier that prompted me to think about Remembrance Day this year. In September, my wife Linda and I had occasion to spend two weeks in Fernie, BC to care for three grandsons -- age 6, 10 and 14 -- while our daughter and son-in-law were away on vacation. One day, I took the boys to the cemetery, and when I showed them the grave marker of Private J. Dingsdale, they were especially interested.

Photo credit: John Chalmers

The gravestone is in memory of a young soldier who lost his life when killed at the Battle of the Somme in France on October 2, 1916. Also remembered is the soldier's brother, Christopher, killed at Coal Creek, near Fernie, on July 4, 1910 at the age of 17. I wondered, could he have lost his life in a coal mining accident? Although I thought he is buried in the cemetery, it would be unlikely that his brother, Private Dingsdale, would be buried there.

The web site of the Commonwealth War Graves Commission showed that Private J. Dingsdale, served with the Royal Canadian Regiment and is buried in Courcelette British Cemetery, near the village of Courcelette in the Somme district of France. The grave of Private Dingsdale is one of 1,970 Commonwealth servicemen buried near the scene of battle. Having seen several such cemeteries in Europe, I am grateful for the ways in which Canadians who never returned home are remembered overseas.

The Courcellette British Cemetery in France. For information on the Battle of the Somme, click here. Photo source: Internet

My grandsons were intrigued to learn of the young soldier. They were also interested in seeing the graves of other soldiers in the cemetery, reading the dates of their deaths and wondering if they died in active service, in battle, or lived out a normal life. As for myself, I continued to wonder -- what was Private Dingsdale's first name?

Photo credit: John Chalmers

I found my answer at the memorial on the grounds of the impressive 1909 Fernie Court House, where the statue of a soldier stands upon a monument that honours the men of Fernie who fell during the Great War. Among the names of all those young men, carved into the stone, is that of Joe Dingsdale. Now I know the name of the young soldier who left Fernie a century ago and went overseas to defend the Empire. In this 100th anniversary year of the start of the Great War, those who never returned from it must not be forgotten.

As Remembrance Day approaches, it is appropriate to honour the men and women who have served Canada's armed forces in time of conflict and peace, especially those who gave their lives to protect the life we enjoy today in Canada.

Becoming a CF-100 Pilot

From the Western Canada Aviation Museum website.

Lawrence Legrange, better known as Larry, is a long-time volunteer at the Western Canada Aviation Museum, a retired elementary school principal and former RCAF CF-100 pilot. Born and raised in Winnipeg, Larry joined the Royal Canadian Air Force after finishing high school in 1957 to fulfill his dream of becoming a pilot. After nearly two years of intense training, Legrange was assigned to 414 Squadron, stationed at North Bay, Ontario. As an interceptor pilot, he played a vital role in identifying unknown aircraft traveling through Canadian airspace during the height of the Cold War. Larry Legrange retired from the Air Force in 1964 and moved back to Winnipeg, where he worked as an educator until his retirement in 1998.

To view the interview with Larry Legrange from May 2014, click here.

More of Larry's interview can be viewed as part of the Western Canada Aviation Museum's new exhibit 'Into the Jet Age'.

Avro built 692 CF-100s for the Royal Canadian Air Force between 1950 and 1958. The aircraft equipped Canada's 13 front-line, all-weather fighter squadrons. Operated by a crew of two, a pilot and airborne interceptor, the CF-100 could reach top speeds in excess of 800 km/h and carried an armament of machine guns and air-to-air rockets – both guided and unguided.

The CF-100 is the only Canadian-designed and Canadian-built fighter aircraft to enter production. It filled a crucial national security roll during the early stages of the Cold War.

CF-100 ready to scramble. Photo credit: Western Canada Aviation Museum

Thank you Stoney Jackson for sharing the story of CAHS member Clark Seaborn with us. Clark flew his restored Gipsy on October 12, 2014 and everything went well. Here is Clarks story:

My Gipsy project started about 25 years ago when I took home the scant remains of a Gipsy which had crashed at Fernie, BC in 1935. It became an active project in 2006 when some other projects were lost in a shop fire. I collected some other parts along the way, some of which likely came from the original CF ADU, so when that registration became available, it was appropriate to use. I also bought an airworthy and flyable Stampe in 2007 intending that to give me some "type" experience, but it turned out to have very much different flying characteristics from the Gipsy. The incorporation of an experimental engine, and the fact that many of the parts for the Gipsy were made in my shop, meant that the authorities classified the aeroplane as a replica, rather than a restoration. As a replica it has been built under the rules for amateur built aeroplanes, which are much more liberal than those governing factory built licensed aeroplanes.

So after 8 years and about 4500 shop hours, the little aeroplane flew. One big challenge was in making an inverted Gipsy Major 1c, somewhat commonly available, able to run in the upright position as were the early engines used in the early Gipsy aircraft.

Oilsands Banquet Celebrates Aviation

Story and photos by John Chalmers,
CAHS Membership Secretary
johnchalmers@shaw.ca

On October 16, the 8th annual Oilsands Banquet in Fort McMurray, Alberta celebrated aviation at a gala dinner which each year recognizes community achievement. This year, the event recognized the accomplishments of the Fort McMurray Aviation Authority and 85 years of aviation in the Wood Buffalo area. The new airport terminal at Fort McMurray opened on time and on budget in June 2014. From the days of early bush pilots serving the Wood Buffalo area when no airports existed, to today's scheduled jet airline service, aviation has been a major contributor to the development of the area.

Fort McMurray Airport Authority president and CEO Scott Clements, left, and artist David Ball are shown with the McKee Trophy and David's portraits of Wop May on the left and Punch Dickins on the right.

On display at the banquet was the Trans-Canada McKee Trophy, Canada's oldest aviation award. It was established in 1927 by Captain J. Dalzell McKee of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, who in 1926 flew with Squadron Leader Albert Earl Godfrey of the Royal Canadian Air Force from Montréal to Vancouver in a Douglas seaplane. McKee was so impressed by the services of the RCAF and the Ontario Provincial Air Service that he established the award known as the McKee Trophy.

It is awarded to a Canadian whose achievements are outstanding in promoting aviation in Canada. In 1973, S/L Godfrey himself was awarded the trophy. It has been awarded 77 times from 1927 to 2012, and is administered by the Canadian Aeronautics and Space Institute. It has been awarded to 47 Members of Canada's Aviation Hall of Fame.

Two recipients of the trophy who have strong ties to aviation in Fort McMurray and are Members of the Hall of Fame are Punch Dickins, who received it in 1928 and Wop May who was the recipient in 1929. In video presentations and in speakers' comments from the podium, great tribute was paid to both men for their days as bush pilots and their contributions to aviation. S/L Godfrey himself was inducted as a Member of the Hall in 1978.

I had the pleasant task of bringing greetings and congratulations from the Hall of Fame. Other greetings were brought from native and government representatives. Featured speakers were Fort McMurray mayor Melissa Blake; WestJet Airlines President and CEO Gregg Saretsky; and retired RCAF LGen Scott Clements, the President and CEO of the Airport Authority.

At far left is Gregg Saretsky, president of WestJet, and at far right is Scott Clements, president of the Fort McMurray Airport Authority. Next to him is Fort McMurray mayor Melissa Blake. The three featured speakers were given smaller reproduction copies of a large painting called "Eagle Over The Snye," by local artist Amy Keller-Rempp, shown by Jason Estrada, left centre, and Jack Farrar. (Photo via the internet)

Phil Enerson of Westbrier Communications, who organizes the event, says it was the best one yet, and "The most special guest here was the McKee Trophy!"

This 1933 Fairchild 71, CF-ATZ, was featured in the printed program of the Oilsands Banquet. It was flown by both Punch Dickins and Wop May for Canadian Airways in the 1930s. It crashed in 1949, was recovered in 1981, then restored, and is displayed at the Alberta Aviation Museum in Edmonton.

Fort McMurray mayor Melissa Blake spoke about the history and importance of early aviation to Fort McMurray when the Snye waterway was “the first airport” and bush planes landed on floats and skis.		Gregg Saretsky, president and CEO of WestJet, described the growth of the airline and future plans, including flights that will go from Fort McMurray to Glasgow, Scotland, with only one change of plane.
In his five years at the head of the Fort McMurray Airport Authority, Scott Clements has seen the building of the new award-winning terminal at the airport, which officially opened in June 2014.		Artist Amy Keller-Rempp with her painting, “Eagle Over The Snye,” commissioned by the Fort McMurray Airport Authority for display at the new Fort McMurray airport terminal. (Internet photo via Twitter)

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