Canadian Aviation History
Showing 1–40 of 43 results
A Gentlemen’s Agreement: Newfoundland And The Struggle For Transatlantic Air Supremacy
The early 1930s were desperate years for Newfoundland, a decade of mass unemployment and looming economic collapse. But it was also a time of great hope for aviation, as aircraft companies raced to build planes that could fly great distances--including across the Atlantic Ocean. No country on either side of the Atlantic wanted to be left behind in the competition for prime landing sites, a situation that placed Newfoundland in the crosshairs for those seeking supremacy in transatlantic flight. Competition for the island's aviation rights was fierce; nations and companies engaged in deals, double-deals, and under-the-radar "Gentlemen's Agreements" in efforts to take control of aviation's greatest prize. Newfoundland's ruling politicians and merchant class, however, were poorly prepared and, in attempting to exercise the Dominion's role in the greater community of nations, unintentionally initiated Newfoundland's loss of independence. Author Robert C. Stone has meticulously researched and unraveled these muddled plots, demonstrating how Newfoundland was, for a time, the most important country in the world--and then gave it all away.
A History of 413 Squadron
Since its birth during World War II, Tusker Squadron has served Canada with pride and distinction. From Ceylon to the Arctic, Europe to the Maritimes, it has watched over the waves for more than fifty years.
The men and women of 413 Squadron have dedicated their lives to saving others, including F/L L.J. Birchall - the Saviour of Ceylon - who successfully warned the Allies of the Japanese invasion before being captured. They have patrolled the Indian Ocean, mapped Canada s North, fought in two wars and conducted all-weather interception. Today, they continue to serve faithfully by carrying out invaluable search and rescue duties along the Atlantic and eastern Arctic coasts.
This is their story, brought to life through numerous archival photos and the words of those who served.
AIRCOM: Canada’s Air Force
AIRCOM is a visual feast that shows all the aircraft operated by Air Command. It also focuses upon the people who make the air force work, and on their many bases. A special section deals with Canada's Hornets in the Persian Gulf War.
And I Shall Fly: The Flying Memoirs of Z. Lewis Leigh
Z. Lewis Leigh was the first pilot to work for Trans Canada Airlines in 1937. During World War II, Leigh joined the Royal Canadian Air Force. His first assignment was anti-submarine flying, but was transferred to Transport Command in 1942 where he would beremembered for his excellent administrative abilities, revolutionizing how Transport Command operated. Leigh continued in RCAF service until 1957.
These memoirs chronicle the years he spent devoted to flying.
Billy Bishop, VC
A brief account of the life and career of the First World War, Canadian fighter pilot, Billy Bishop.
Billy Bishop: Canadian Hero
Billy Bishop was fiercely ambitious, driven by an undisguised hatred of his enemies. He played hard and fought even harder. A highly skilled pilot and a crack shot, "top gun" of the Allied air forces, by 1918 Bishop was the most highly decorated war hero in Canadian history.
He remains the most controversial. Some of Bishop's fellow pilots were repelled by his grandstanding and suspected he was deliberately inflating his number of "kills." Since then, the claim has been repeated by many others. This issue is at the heart of Billy Bishop: Canadian Hero.
In this updated second edition, author Dan McCaffery reviews the evidence in support his account of what Bishop really did in the skies over France, setting the record straight about one of this country's most famous and controversial figures.
Bush Pilot’s Mayday: Bush Pilot’s Journal Book One
Bush Pilot’s Mayday is true life adventure based on logbook entries and recollections of the author’s fellow pilots and companions. Ken Forscutt flew a Cessna floatplane for 17 years into various places in Northwestern Canada, the Yukon and the Northwest Territories. His aircraft was equipped with a minimum of radio gear and all navigation was done the “old way” - with maps and a simple compass.Here, Forscutt relates the many adventures and misadventures that befell him as a private pilot. After learning to fly in Manitoba, Ken made numerous trips to remote northern Manitoba lakes for hunting and ice fishing expeditions. In one hair raising adventure, Ken finds himself clinging to a pontoon and locked out of the plane’s cabin as it propels itself across a lake and up into the air. In another, he mistakes the sound of a seat belt banging against the outside of the plane, for a missing strut and causes himself unnecessary grief in landing the plane. Ken often flew parties and individuals to remote fishing lakes in Alberta where fish and adventures abound. He flew in the Northwest Territories where he had several close calls - while landed on an ice field en route to Tuktoyaktuk, Ken is forced to make an impromptu take off when the plane and its occupants are chased by an angry Polar Bear sow and cub. He mistakenly flies into restricted air space when he runs into the Mid Canada Early Warning System. This is a well written book that will appeal to aviators, armchair pilots and anyone who like a good story told well.
Canada’s Air Force: At War and Peace: Volume 2
No-one interested in the history of Canadian military aviation will want to miss this 3-volume series from Larry Milberry!
Volume 2 completes 1939-45. Ch.1 & 2 cover night fighters, intruders & medium bombers. Much on Canadians on Defiants, Beaufighters & Mosquitos, the former a period of frustration, the latter of success. Many personal stories end happily, but sad times also fill the pages. Ch.3 deals with Bomber Command, beginning with Canadians on RAF squadrons, then moves to the first RCAF squadrons on Hampdens & Wellingtons. With some 70,000 words, Ch.3 says much of the bombing campaign. If CAFWP has a brutal chapter, this is it -- some 10,000 young Canadians die on bombers. Chief data sources are the official 6 Group records + diaries, logs & albums of the men who were there. Ch.4 studies Coastal Command on Beaufighters, Liberators, Sunderlands, etc. 60,000 words of new coverage and photos. While RCAF at War revealed new material on the Hornell VC, more is added here. Special coverage of 422 & 423 Sqns (Sunderlands) is not to be missed, nor are the excerpts from combat reports. Air transport is the theme of Ch.5, with more of Norseman, Dakota, Fortress, etc.
Canada’s Air Force: At War and Peace: Volume 3
No-one interested in the history of Canadian military aviation will want to miss this 3-volume series from Larry Milberry!
The first title dedicated solely to the postwar RCAF and the largest of all general RCAF histories. Beginning with the post-1945 slowdown, you'll read how Canada disposed of 1000s of surplus aircraft, whether burned, buried, or sold to get-rich-quick entrepreneurs. Next? The panicky built-up to Korea and the Cold War. Here are all the details about Vampires, Mustangs, Sabres & CF-100s; North Stars & C-119s; Lancasters, Neptunes & Argus; Harvards & T-33s. One chapter deals with R&D projects, whether Arctic navigation, flight test, or weapons; one about the CF-105 will be an eye-opener for those taken in by the Arrow myth makers. Vol.3 has hundreds of fresh colour photos from the 1950s-60s. Dozens of reminiscences enliven this era. Vol.3 takes you beyond unification to the 1970s.
Canada’s Fighting Pilots
First published in the 1960s and long out of print, Edmund Cosgrove recounts the lives of Canadas outstanding pilots and their exploits in the two world wars. From the brilliant individualists who flew in the First World War to the tough and dedicated bomber crews of the Second, this is the story of Canadian airmen and their remarkable contribution to the war effort. An essential book for any aviation and history enthusiast, the superbly readable original text that made this book a classic in its day is now supplemented with new and unpublished photos.
Gathered together here are the stories of some of Canadas most celebrated pilots; William "Billy" Bishop, whose daring, solo dawn raid on a German airfield won him the Victoria Cross; William Barker, who fought single-handedly an entire squadron of enemy aircraft; George "Buzz" Beurling, the ace of Malta who achieved a remarkable score of victories fighting from an island under siege; and Andrew Mynarski, whose attempts to save the life of a trapped comrade, high over Germany, ultimately cost him his own. This is their unforgettable story.
Canada’s National Aviation Museum: Its History and Collections
The museum was first formed in 1964 at RCAF Station Rockcliffe as the National Aeronautical Collection from the amalgamation of three separate existing collections. These included the National Aviation Museum at Uplands, which concentrated on early aviation and bush flying; the Canadian War Museum collection, which concentrated on military aircraft, and which included many war trophies, some dating back to World War One, and the RCAF Museum which focused on those aircraft operated by the Royal Canadian Air Force.
In 1988 the collection was moved to a new experimental type triangular hangar. This book, published on the occasion of the opening the new hangar, depicts the Museum's beautiful history from its early beginnings in the halls of the National Research Council in the thirties to its present world-class status.
Canadian Women in the Sky: 100 Years of Flight
How a few women fought to board planes, then fly them, and finally to break through earths atmosphere into space.
The story of how women in Canada, from Newfoundland to British Columbia, struggled to win a place in the world of air travel, first as passengers, then as flight attendants and pilots, and, finally, as astronauts. Anecdotes, sometimes humourous and always amazing, trace these womens challenges and successes, their slow march over 100 years from scandal to acceptance, whether in Second World War skies, in hostile northern bush country, and even beyond Earths atmosphere.
From the time the first woman climbed on board a flying machine as a passenger to the moment a Canadian woman astronaut visited the International Space Station, this is an account of how the sky-blue glass ceiling eventually cracked, allowing passionate and determined air-crazy women the opportunity to fly.
Dancing in the Sky: The Royal Flying Corps in Canada
Dancing in the Sky is the first complete telling of the First World War fighter pilot training initiative established by the British in response to the terrible losses occurring in the skies over Europe in 1916. This program, up and running in under six months despite enormous obstacles, launched Canada into the age of flight ahead of the United States.
The results enabled the Allies to regain control of the skies and eventually win the war, but at a terrible price. Flying was in its infancy and pilot training primitive. This is the story of the talented and courageous men and women who made the training program a success, complete with the romance, tragedy, humour, and pathos that accompany an account of such heroic proportions. A valuable addition to Canadas military history, this book will appeal to all who enjoy an exceptional adventure story embedded in Canadas past.
Fall of an Arrow
On February 20, 1959, Prime Minister John Diefenbaker announced to the House of Commons the cancellation of the CF-105 Arrow. Its development costs to that time were $340 million. The Arrow was to be the world's unsurpassed interceptor aircraft. Yet within two months of the Prime Minister's announcement, six completed aircraft were dismantled and all papers and documents associated with the project were destroyed.
Here is the history and development of the Arrow - the plane that would make Canada the leader in supersonic flight technology. The Arrow was designed to fly at twice the speed of sound and carry the most advanced missile weapons system.
Here are the stories of the men and women who were in the vanguard of the new technology - who had come from England, Poland, and the United States to make aviation history.
Flying Canucks II: Pioneers of Canadian Aviation
Among the many technological advances of this century that have shrunk our country, few have had as great an impact as aviation. Technologies evolve and national priorities change, but the qualities necessary to design aircraft, fly them in war and peace, and manage airlines remain constant. In this, his second book about pioneers of Canadian aviation, Peter Pigott brings a richness and understanding of the individuals themselves to the reader.
Flying Canucks II takes us into Air Canadas boardroom with Claude I. Taylor, to the Avro Arrow design office with Jim Floyd, inside the incredible career of Aviation Hall of Fame pilot Herb Seagram, on C.D. Howes historic dawn-to-dusk flight, and with Len Birchall in a Stranraer seaplane before he became, in Churchills phrase, The Saviour of Ceylon. It includes the story of how Scottish immigrant J.A. Wilson engineered a chain of airports across the country, how bush pilot Bob Randall explored the polar regions, and the ordeal of Erroll Boyd, the first Canadian to fly the Atlantic. The lives of Buck McNair and Bus Davey, half a century after the Second World War, are placed in the perspective of the entire national experience in those years. Whenever possible, Mr. Pigott has interviewed the players themselves, and drawing on his experience and contacts within the aviation community, has created a multi-faceted study of the business, politics, and technology that influenced the ten lives explored in depth in this book.
C.D. Howe, wartime Canadas absolute government czar used to say that running the countrys airline was all he really wanted to do. With a rich aviation heritage such as this, Flying Canucks II depicts the elements and the enemy at their worst and the pioneers of Canadian aviation at their best.
Flying under Fire, Volume Two: More Aviation Tales from the Second World War
Building on the success of the previous volume, Flying Under Fire, Volume Two, features nine more personal accounts from Canadian pilots who flew in the Second World War. From training camps to posting across Canada, Britain, Europe, and North Africa, these stories capture the excitement, fear, hope, and dread of war-time service, and are all told with the vivid detail of first-hand experience.
The contributors to this volume are a distinguished group: two are Air Commodores, three are Hall of Fame members, one has an Order of Canada and a McKee Trophy, and five have Distinguished Flying Crosses. Some, including Art Wahlroth and Bob Fowler, flew bombing missions in the war, many were fighters, and others, like Bill Carr and Jack Winship, performed reconnaissance duties, but all brought back tales of incredible resourcefulness and courage in the face of danger. And central to all their stories are the planes - Mosquitoes, Spitfires, Wellingtons, Meteors, Mitchells, and Kittyhawks fill the pages, each exhibiting the special quirks and personalities the pilots came to know and trust.
Flying Under Fire, Volume Two, pays tribute to the roughly 35,000 Canadian airmen involved in the Second World War, honouring their contributions and preserving their stories for generations to come.
Flying Under Fire: Canadian Fliers Recall the Second World War
Thousands of young Canadians volunteered for service in the RCAF, RAF, and other air services during WWII, risking their lives to protect others. The airforce played a critical part in the Allied victory and the stories of those brave men and women are as powerful and gripping as they were sixty years ago.
The stories collected in Flying Under Fire were originally published in the Canadian Aviation Historical Society Journal and are the first-hand accounts of pilots, trainees, and ground crew who recall the danger, excitement, tragedy, and victory of serving their country. They bring an immediacy and a special brand of grim humour to their tales, capturing the hopes, fears, and spirit of the times.
This book, made possible by the survivors of a long and difficult war, is dedicated to the memory of the 14,541 air personnel who did not return.
For the Love of Flying
This book tells the story of Laurentian Air Services and its subsidiaries, Air Schefferville, Delay River Outfitters and more. Drawing on interviews with Laurentian's owners, pilots and ground crew, Danielle Metcalfe-Chenail explores this innovative company's colorful 60-year history from its founding in Ottawa in 1936 with Waco biplanes through the 1990s when it operated twin-engine turboprops. This book is filled with lively flying anecdotes from the cockpits of world-famous bushplanes, including the de Havilland Beaver and Otter, the Douglas DC-3 and the Grumman Goose. From daring rescues and close calls, to the filming of Hollywood's "Captains of the Clouds," Laurentian's pilots did it all. Interlaced with these fascinating accounts are stories of back-country air tourism, the mineral and hydro-power boom in Quebec and Newfoundland-Labrador and tales of flying into fishing and hunting camps in remote regions of Ungava. With an exciting collection of photographs - many never before published - this is a long-overdue book that will appeal to all who enjoy the romance of flying on the frontier.
Hands to Flying Stations: A Recollective History of Canadian Naval Aviation 1945-1954 (Volume 1)
In the first ten years, fifty eight young men of all ranks died, serving in the cause of Canadian Naval Aviation. Volume One of HANDS TO FLYING STATIONS describes for the first time those early days, and is the story as told by those who were there.
Hands to Flying Stations: A Recollective History of Canadian Naval Aviation 1955-1969 (Volume 2)
As told by those who were there, this is the story of the early years of Canadian Naval Aviation.
Heartbreak and Heroism: Canadian Search and Rescue Stories
This book is about some of the most dramatic search-and-rescue operations in Canada. Whether the action is on the heaving deck of a sinking ship off the Newfoundland coast, within the incredibly confining walls of a power plant in Ontario, or high on a cliff face on a British Columbia mountain, each of these stories is exciting, memorable, and true. They are accounts of courage, loyalty, perseverance, and sacrifice that knows no bounds.
We read of the heartbreaking last days of an Anglican missionary fighting for his life in a lonely Arctic outpost. Another chapter relays a dramatic rooftop rescue in New Brunswick. We meet people who are saved from floods, fires, plane crashes, earth movements, and violent storms. No less are the stories of the sometimes unexpected and tragic losses of the rescuers.
Because Canada is so vast, Search and Rescue capability has to span the nation, and extend from sea to sea to sea. No other country has done what we have done. Heartbreak and Heroism is popular history at its most exciting.
Mid-Air Moose Jaw (1st Edition)
Mid-Air Moose Jaw explores the mystery and expels the rumors of the 1954 mid-air collision over the city of Moose Jaw, Saskatchewan. A NATO Harvard training plane and a Trans Canada Air-Lines North Star collided in clear weather with the loss of thirty-seven lives. The airliner crashed into a home on Third Avenue Northeast, killing Martha Hadwen, the only fatality from Moose Jaw. Ross School, with 350 students was a mere 400 feet from the crash site. Many Moose Jaw residents witnessed the collision. Varied eyewitnesses accounts and surviving family members recollections are included. While newspaper coverage of this disaster was extensive, Mid-Air Moose Jaw ferrets out many untold anecdotes giving the reader a greater in-depth understanding of this horrific disaster.
How and why this mid-air collision took place is covered extensively with careful reference to the three Boards of inquiry. While some readers may find this aspect technical, the book is balanced with the human and sociological aspects following the disaster. Mid-Air Moose Jaw challenges pilots to practice proper collision avoidance techniques. At the same time the book reminds administrators and legislators of their responsibility to act diligently and promptly to potential aviation hazards. Since 1954 flying has become much safer with advanced technology. Mid-Air Moose Jaw is a tribute to those who paid with their lives to make aviation safer yet never to take that safety for granted.
Photographing Canada from Flying Canoes
The story of the pioneers who photographed Canada from the air. Air photography was essential in establishing provincial and national borders, building highways, etc.
Polar Winds: A Century of Flying North
Polar Winds traces a century of northern flight from balloonatics to bush pilots and beyond.
"They were all gamblers and fortune seekers. They did things on their own were independent people who wanted to be free to roam. They were good people, but, of course, some were loners or escapists. They all depended strictly on their wits."
Joe McBryan, pilot and owner of Yellowknife-based Buffalo Airways, was talking about gold prospectors in the 1940s when he said this, but he could just as easily have been describing the aviators who have flown northern skies for over a hundred years. They were adventurers and pioneers, but also just men and women doing what was required to make a living north of the sixtieth parallel.
Polar Winds uses the stories of these pilots and others to explore the greater history of air travel in the North, from the Klondike Gold Rush through to the end of the twentieth century. It encompasses everything from exploration flights to the North Pole in airships to passenger travel in jet liners; flying school buses for residential schools to indigenous pilots performing mercy flights; and from the harrowing crashes to the routine supply runs that make up daily life in the North. Above all, it is a unique history told through the experiences of northerners on the ground and in the sky.
Raymond Collishaw and the Black Flight
Ever wondered what it would be like to fly a biplane or triplane in the First World War? Raymond Collishaw and the Black Flight takes you to the Western Front during the Great War. Experience the risks of combat and the many close calls Collishaw had as a pilot, flight commander, and squadron leader. Understand the courage Collishaw and his fellow flyers faced every day they took to the air in their small, light, and very manoeuvrable craft to face the enemy.
As the third-highest-scoring flying ace among British and colonial pilots in the First World War, scoring 60 victories, Collishaw was only surpassed by Billy Bishop and Edward Mannock. This book traces Collishaw's life from humble beginnings in Nanaimo, British Columbia, to victories in the skies over France.
Shutting Down the National Dream: A. V. Roe and the Tragedy of the Avro Arrow
An account 'of the rise and fall of a Avro Canada, an aircraft manufacture that over its lifespan came close to some aviation firsts, but through bad timing, government indifference, political hostility (or American pressure?) and management decisions, it failed to achieve what it might have. The end comes in the mid-1950s with the Arrow, a jet fighter that some believe was not equaled anywhere until the mid-1970s.
Sixty Years: The RCAF and CF Air Command 1924-1984
This book is a comprehensive history of Canadian military aviation during this period. It is a large format book, and is almost 500 pages long. Many of the profiles are of rare Canadian aircraft, not just the usual Spitfires and Sabres. Naval aviation is not covered. 60 Years is extremely well-illustrated, including a thirty-page section of colour profiles and there are hundreds of black-and-white photos.
Storms of Controversy: Secret Avro Arrow Files Revealed
The development of the Avro Arrow was a remarkable Canadian achievement. Its mysterious cancellation in February 1959 prompted questions that have long gone unanswered.
- What role did the Central Intelligence Agency play in the scrapping of the project?
- Who in Canada’s government was involved in that decision?
- What, if anything, did Canada get in return?
- Who ordered the blowtorching of all the prototypes?
- And, did Arrow technology find its way into the American Stealth fighter/bomber program?
Storms of Controversy answers these questions. Using never-before-released documents, the book exploded the myth that design flaws, cost overruns, or obsolescence had triggered the demise of the Arrow.
Storms of Controversy: The Secret Avro Arrow Files Revealed (3rd Edition)
New documents clarify the American government's role in the scandalous decision to scrap the Avro Arrow.
Not since the Spitfire of World War II has an aircraft single-handedly captured a nation's imagination, and no one has uncovered more new insights into this legendary aircraft than Palmiro Campagna. For this edition, Campagna has done just that, turning up new documents that further clarify John Diefenbaker's role in the Arrow cover-up, addressing Cabinet Minister Pierre Sevigny's mysterious claims in February 1998 about the destruction of the Arrow, and asking why, when the names of so many government officials appeared on the orders to kill the Arrow, Diefenbaker alone shouldered the blame.
The Wing and the Arrow
It's the beginning of the Cold War - a new and threatening power is emerging in the Soviet Union which escalates the pace in the race for the skies. This contest will pit East against West, friend against friend, and the US Wing against the Canadian Arrow.
Winged Peace: The Story of the Air Age
First published in 1944, Winged Peace is the story of aviation, and its future as seen through the eyes of Canada's leading fighter pilot ace in World War I. From Kitty Hawk to B-29 Superfortresses, Bishop shows us how the world had changed geographically, socially, economically, and politically. Bishop wrote Winged Peace during the darkest years of World War II, when Germany had perfected flight for conquest. He examines air power as an instrument for death, as well as the advances in peace and betterment for all that flight is capable of making. There is no greater testament to the imagination and resourcefulness of people than the incredible development and growth of aviation technology in this century. Bishop recognizes this and also the need for international control of air power: 'holding under closest control the means to destruction inherent in aviation and developing our aviation for the good of all mean and the peace of world.
Winged Warfare: The Illustrared Classic Autobiography of Canadian World War I Ace Billy Bishop
Billy Bishop enlisted as an infantryman at the outbreak of World War I. He soon transferred to the Royal Flying Corps where flying came as naturally to him as breathing. In this classic autobiography, Billy Bishop vividly recreates the early days when the 'airborne jalopy' was getting its trial run. He describes the tiny Nieuport Scout, armed with a single Lewis gun, in which he had to dodge the 'Archies' (anti-aircraft batteries) and fight the scarlet tri-winged Fokkers flown by the formidable Baron von Richthofen and his squadron. The heroic memoir that portrays a real Canadian hero facing a skilled and determined enemy - Winged Warfare gets more exciting with every take off.