Airlines in Canada
After the First World War, Canadian flyers returned home from Europe, and
dozens of old Curtiss JN4 Canucks and other war surplus aircraft became
available for peace-time pursuits. Encouraged by nothing more than
their dreams, and a desire to make careers in aviation, a number of these
veterans formed companies and went into business. Many became stunt
flyers, performing at country fairs and exhibitions, with their mechanics
walking on the plane's wings or dangling by their arms from its
undercarriage. Some tried to establish air freight and passenger
services. Others offered to carry mail. But few people in those
days trusted their letters, not to mention their lives, to such dangerous
conveyances. Nevertheless, during the years between the wars, aviation
in Canada developed into a national enterprise.
On 7 August, 1919, Captain Ernest Hoy flew a JN-4 from Vancouver through the mountains to Calgary. The old Curtiss tariner could not fly over 7000 feet, and so came very close to solid earth as it traversed the mountain passes. The flight took 16 hours and 20 minutes, including a number of stops to refuel along the way, and proved that aviation, even over the roughest of Canada's terrain, was a serious method of transportation.
In 1919, most of Canada's north was unexplored country. Flyers in primitive aircraft put the wilderness on the map. Flying boats like the Curtiss HS-2L provided access to thousands of nature's ready-made airports -- lakes and rivers. They were essential to the discovery and development of the country's natural resources. The early pioneer pilots began making Canada into a vast community linked by highways in the sky. The hair-raising experiences of Canada's bush flyers in some of the most inhospitable wilderness territory on earth have become legendary.
One of the most opportune areas for aspiring flyers was Canada's northland, with its sparse population, its great distances between settlements, and its wide uncharted spaces dotted with thousands of lakes. Aircraft, equipped with pontoons or skis and so able to land on the lakes or the snow-covered tundra, seemed like a ready-made solution to the problem of transportation and communication in this vast undeveloped region.
Following the lead of others, veteran pilot Wop May bought a war surplus JN-4 and looked around for ways to make a living with it. He set up an aerial paper route, flying newspapers from Edmonton to outlying communities, but could not make enough money to pay for his plane's fuel. He then turned his attention northward, and began flying out loads of furs. This was the beginning of a career as one of a new breed of Canadian heroes, the bush pilots, who braved sub-zero weather and countless hardships and dangers to service trappers, prospectors, miners and Native people across the North. May made headlines in the winter 1928 when he flew his open-cockpit Avro Avian into Little Red River, an isolated settlement otherwise accessible only by dog-team. May was carrying serum needed to avert an epidemic of dyptheria which was threatening to wipe out the community.
Bush pilots were also active in other parts of Canada. In 1919 several JN-4s were used in to make aerial surveys of timber reserves in southern Labrador. By 1920, bush pilots in Northern Quebec were spotting forest fires and ferrying men and equipment in to hot spots. In Northern Ontario they were carrying out photographic surveys for aerial map making. In 1921 Imperial Oil set up an air service to supply oil drilling crews along the Mackenzie River. On the West Coast airplanes were being used to spot fish poachers and nab illegal whiskey makers on the Gulf Islands. In 1927, Romeo Vachon began a regular mail service into isolated communities along the North Shore of the St. Lawrence River, and on Anticosta and the Magdeleine Islands. By the late 1920s, people in Canada's far flung communities had begun to accept the airplane and its bush pilots as a normal and necessary part of their lives.
During the 1920s and 1930s, many small bush flying companies began operating limited service across the country. They carried people, equipment and supplies primarily for the natural resources industries, delivered mail and performed aerial surveying and mapping. In 1934, Canada set the world record for freight carried -- mail and machines, eggs and dynamite, cows and canoes, medicine and furniture. You name it, they flew it.
As the small bush companies grew, they became the precursors of Canada's modern airlines. Western Canada Airways, formed by Winnipeg businessman James A. Richardson in 1926, eventually became Canadian Pacific Airlines and more recently Canadian Airlines International. In 1937, the Canadian government established Trans-Canada Air Lines (TCA), now known as Air Canada, to provide transcontinental air transport service in this country.
By 1939, the government-owned TCA was operating regular scheduled flights across the country. A passenger could fly from Halifax to Vancouver, a distance of 2500 miles, in about 18 hours.
Airlines in Canada
Canadian Airways
Coast Air Transport
MacKenzie Air Service
Trans-Canada Air Lines
Western Canadian Airways
