Flying Canucks: Famous Canadian Aviators

A.A. den Otter is a professor of history at the Memorial University of
Newfoundland and co-author of Lethbridge: A Centennial History.

Transportation has been an important element in Canada’s national
history. Confronted by enormous distances and an expansive North, it is
not surprising that Canadians have made an important contribution to
aviation. This book is a tribute to the role Canadian pilots, airline
executives, and aviation engineers have played in the development of air
transport.

Pigott has chosen 37 giants in aviation, ranging from John A. McCurdy,
who flew the first Canadian heavier-than-air machine in 1909, to George
W. McConachie, who began his career by running a small two-airplane
business and ended it by managing the large Canadian Pacific fleet. Also
included are legendary war pilots like Russell Bannock, Billy Bishop,
William Barker, and Ian Bazalgette; bush pilots like “Punch” Dickens
and “Wop” May; and engineers and builders like Robert B. Cornelius
Noorduyn, who rebuilt a Fokker aircraft into the indomitable Universal,
the workhorse of the North in the 1920s.

Only two women make it onto Pigott’s list: Elsie MacGill, an avionics
engineer who designed the Maple Leaf Trainer and at the pinnacle of her
career became the chair of the United Nations Stress Analysis Committee;
and Katherine Stinson, an American who first gained fame with
record-breaking publicity flights for the Red Cross and subsequently
flew stunts on the Canadian prairies.

The biographies are short and highly readable. Unfortunately, they are
organized alphabetically, which precludes a sense of the historical
development of aviation in Canada and leads to occasional repetitions in
the material.