Who Killed the Avro Arrow?

Stephen Greenhalgh is Prospect Research Analyst, Advancement Services,
University of Alberta.

Who Killed the Avro Arrow? is one of the latest works of non-fiction from Canadian writer and historian Chris Gainor, an expert in the history of technology.

Divided into short chapters, each less than four or five pages in length, the book examines the history of the Canadian Avro Arrow interceptor aircraft from the end of the Second World War to its demise under the Progressive Conservative government of John Diefenbaker in the late 1950s. Early chapters focus on the history of the Arrow, whereas later chapters deal with the cancellation of the project and the destruction of the five existing aircraft built between 1957 and 1959.

Gainor’s expertise in Canadian aviation history is immediately apparent as chapters provide a wealth of detail on both the state of the industry in Canada during the 1950s and the Avro Arrow project itself. The author rightfully highlights the prominence of the Arrow in the contemporary popular mind, in addition to the mystery that many feel surrounds the project’s demise and the hasty recycling of all five aircraft. Overall, Gainor offers the reader a well-researched and balanced account for the Arrow’s cancellation in 1959. A downside is that the reader must wait until the later chapters before the author begins to address the primary intention of the book: who killed the Avro Arrow? Moreover, a unifying argument to weave the chapters together is mostly lacking, only beginning to surface towards the end as Gainor addresses the cancellation of the project.

Still, Who Killed the Avro Arrow? offers an insightful look into one of Canada’s most fascinating and contentious eras of aviation history.