Aviation Memorabilia Newsletter

 

1946 - November 1 - With the withdrawal by Canadian Pacific Airlines from the Vancouver - Victoria route, TCA quadrupled its service and re-established service, relinquished in 1937, between Vancouver - Seattle with DC-3 equipment.

 

The incursion of the DC-3's into the West was on September 15, 1946 when all trans-continental flights as far as Winnipeg began operating with the 21 -passenger equipment, the new aircraft were also introduced on Flights 5 and 6 between North Bay and Winnipeg. DC-3's were to proceed on to Lethbridge later in 1946.

 

 

From The NetLetter archives –

 

Here we have a few front covers of the 'Between Ourselves' magazine from April – June 1946

 

 

Issue dated September 1946 

 

 

Chicago’s big friendly hand was outstretched to TCA when we came flying in from the North, and the great Illinois city left us in no doubt as to the warmth of our welcome.

 

Crew of the inaugural flight: Stewardess Victoria Stuart on the steps and Captains Weatherall and Seagrim and First Officer Renwick on the left.

 

 

Editors' Note: Below is a photo of the same aircraft, a Douglas DC-3 (CF-TDR) taken at Winnipeg August 17, 1968. 

 

Shown here on short lease by Transair from Matane Air Services of Quebec. The next year it was exported to the US and cancelled as N3773 on 14 March 1972.

 

 

Photo and comments courtesy of Tim Martin. 

 

On July 10, 1946 a giant, four engine TCA Lancaster, only 28 hours out of London, England, lowered its wheels over Vancouver Airport, marking the completion of the first direct commercial flight from the United Kingdom to the Pacific Coast and the first non-stop commercial flight flown by TCA across Canada.

The aircraft which made the flight in connection with Vancouver's Diamond Jubilee celebrations, was greeted at the airport by a large crowd, including Mayor J. W. Cornett of Vancouver.

Members of the crew who took over the controls of the TCA Lancaster at Montreal for the second leg of the United Kingdom to Vancouver flight.

 

Left to right: Captain G. H, Lothian; Radio Officer W, Lucas; F. M. McGregor, Operations Manager of the Trans-Atlantic Service, who made the flight in an official capacity; Captain J. A.Wright; Navigator P. O. Powell and Purser-Steward D. V. Miller.

 

In the foreground are Captain Lewis (right) and First Officer Harrison, the two pilots who flew the aircraft from Great Britain to Montreal.

 

 

From the 'horizons' magazine  

 Issue dated September 2003

 

Program Management Office team. 

Seated, left to right: Kirsi Ulmonen, Sam Pellegrino, Sandra Boyle, Kara Gill, Nancy Rockbrune.

 

Standing, left to right; Lucy Franco, Line Robinson, Carole Charbonneau, Denis Chalifoux, Vicki Benoit, Lise Lefaive, Pauline Nghiem, Claire Thermidor and Luc Desautels.

 

Video conferencing; Lynda Zavitz (left) and Sandra Dick in Vancouver.

 

 

Issue dated October 2003

 

In all the years we’ve been publishing Horizons (and now New Horizons) we've tried to blend the serious with the lighter side. In the last few years, however, we’ve tended more towards the serious because we've had a lot of difficult things to deal with... frankly, none of it's been funny.

So to give ourselves and you, our devoted reader, a break, we’ve dispensed with the usual news in this issue to give you something that hopefully will make your day a bit brighter.

 

We want to give you a well-deserved time out. Employee Communications is a privileged group - we get to hear about a lot of great things about employees and we're going to make a real effort to share more of these good stories with you as we go on. We hope you enjoy it.

 

Jane MacGregor,
Director, Employee Communications