 The NetLetter
For Air Canada Retirees
(part of the ACFamily Network)
July 2, 2011 - Issue 1171
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First Issue published in October 1995!
(over 5,400 subscribers)
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Donation Information
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Send cheques payable to "ACFamily Network" to:
ACFamily Network
#800 - 15355 24th Ave, Suite 523
Surrey, BC V4A 2H9
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Pay by Credit Card
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| Greetings! |
We welcome you to allow the NetLetter to be your platform, and opportunity, to relive your history while working for either TCA, AC, CPAir, CAIL, PWA, AirBC, Wardair. etal. and share your experiences with us!
The NetLetter is an email newsletter published every weekend and contains a mixture of nostalgia, current news and travel tips. We encourage our readers to submit their stories, photos and/or comments from either days gone by or from present day experiences and trips. If we think that the rest of our readers will enjoy it, we will publish it here
We also This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. in regard to anything we post here. Many readers have commented with additional information, names and personal memories from the photos and articles presented here.
The NetLetter, which is free, is open to anyone that wishes to subscribe but is targeted to retired employees from Air Canada, Canadian Airlines and all the other companies that were part of what Air Canada is today. Thanks for joining us!
Terry & your NetLetter Team
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ACRA Upcoming Events- Compiled by Alan Rust
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 Retirees Welcome!
The following events are available for retirees through ACRA, the Air Canada Recreation Association. |
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Where: Montreal, Quebec, Canada
When: Thursday, September 29 to Saturday, October 1, 2011
For more inforation visit: www.acrabadminton.org.uk
Retirees Welcome!
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 Are you aware of an ACRA Event that is open to retirees? Please use the online form by following this link to submit your ACRA Event. (ACRA Events only please)
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| Women in Aviation - Compiled by Terry Baker |
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 From the "Canadi>n Flyer" magazine issued July 1997 -
Rosella Bjornson became the first female First Officer in north America when she was hired by Winnipeg based Transair in 1973. She was also the first female to be hired by a commercial airline in Canada, and first female member of the Canadian Airline Pilot's Association.
On June 6th 1997 Rosella was inducted into Canada's Aviation Hall of Fame. Here is a photo taken during the induction.
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| Our first 70 years - Compiled by Terry Baker |
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1955
- Nov 1st - DC-3 service inaugurated into northern Ontario and Quebec taking over the routes obtained from CPA in exchange for routes to South America.
- Nov 1st - Viscount equipment extended to Vancouver.
1973
- Oct 29th - Direct jet service from Moncton to Toronto commenced with DC-9 equipment.
- Dec 1st - Preclearance into the US reintroduced at YUL and YYZ. YHZ due March 1974
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| Reader Submitted Photos - Compiled by Terry Baker |
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 Reader Submitted Photos - The photos and information below was sent to us by our faithful readers. If you would like to send us some old photos you have lying around. we will consider them for publication in a future NetLetter. We prefer good quality airline related photos, with descriptive text included with the submission.
Al Catterall has sent us some photos, and here are some of them -
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 Performing secretarial duties from left to right, Ursula Fehsenfeld and Margaret Wilson. |
 Here we have Margaret Bishop, Nordair employee in Montreal. |
 TCA aircraft taking off at Vancouver BC. |
 This is Art Arnold, Reservations Manager. |
 RAPCAN (Retired Airline Pilots of Canada) had this article in their newsletter about a recent visit to Vancouver Island by a group of RAPCAN members. To find out more about RAPCAN and to possibly become a member, please see the information at www.rapcan.ca
Thirty-three retired romeo's (real old men eating out) attended a Victoria area luncheon at Marys Blue Moon Cafe, situated not far from the ferry dock at Swartz Bay, and directly across the street from a Vintage Aircraft Museum displaying amongst many interesting aircraft a pristine Air Canada Viscount in it's final throes of restoration.
Rapcan members from Vancouver Ray Nelson, Vic Bastow, Angus Ingram, Ray Martin, Don Quistberg, Jim McDevitt, Frank Mizurka, Bill McComb, John Racey, Al Ashcroft, Trevor Bolitho, and Brian Bjarnason were joined for the ferry ride from Vancouver by Toronto members Fred Thompson, Bill Woodbyrne, Gordie Merryfield, and Ron Matwey. Hopefully this will become an annual event for anyone in the system that wants to enjoy wonderful scenery of B.C.'s coast, and renewing friendships of glory days gone by.
Victoria members hosting the event were Dick Munday, Barry Adams, Tom Stockdill, Jim Dwinnell, Rob Barr, Stan Hegstrom, Ken Slack, Bill Say, Bob Hallworth, Barry Hill, Gus de Jardin, Keith Ohman, Doug Storey, Paul Stenner, Reid Hannan, Al Gejdos and Roland Boisvert.
A great luncheon, followed by a tour of the museum, a smooth ferry ride and viewing of sun drenched B.C. coast, with snow capped mountains topped off the event.
We have these photos, and acknowledge the identifications provided by Walter Haskin.
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 Ron Matwey |
 Fred Thompson |
 Bob Hallworth and Keith Ohman |
 Jim McDevitt and Bill Woodbyrne |
 Vic Bastow, Don Quistberg, Stan Hegstrom, Gus de Jardin and Ray Nelson |
 Ray Martin and Vic Bastow |
 And three group photos. |
| TCA/Air Canada People Gallery - Compiled by Terry Baker |
 Musings from the "Between Ourselves" and "Horizons" magazine, an Air Canada publication from years gone by, and various in-house magazines.
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Issue dated - October 1955
From "Between Ourselves" magazine -
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 Our 14th Vickers Viscount was on display at the SBAC Farnboroiugh UK during the 1955 show. |
 A new Regional Operations building at Darmouth in 1955. |
 EVERYTHING HAS PRETTY WELL Fallen into its rightful place in our Operations department's new Organization at Dartmouth Airport. Above is the new Flight Dispatch Room and shows dispatchers Jim Dickie, Eric Bracher and Howard Colburne as' work as well as Aubrey Young and Jim Dunsire, assistant dispatchers. |
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Issue dated - November 1955
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 Viscount fin 608 landed at Vancouver International airport on September 21st to provide the first glimpse of the aircraft to westerners, and provide courtesy flights to Seattle and Victoria. Capt's Art Rankin, Jim Storic, and F/O Ian Jackson were on the flight deck.
AN OFFICIAL RECEPTION PARTY met the Viscount on arrival at Seattle-Tacoma Airport.
Left to right are Norman C. Senior, Canadian Consul General; Stewardess Doris Jensen; Mayor Alan Pomeroy of Seattle; Stewardess Isobel Barker; Ted Deyman, District Traffic and Sales Manager, Seattle; Mayor Harold M. Tollefson, Tacoma; Stewardess Muriel Ryan; Rod Macinnes, Director of Public Relations and Stewardess Vi Zwick.
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Issue dated - December 1973
From the "Horizons" magazine -
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 Does anyone remember the Planemate? They were in operation at Toronto and Mirabel. Here is a photo to help your memory. |
 And here are some of the comments made by the public and media. |
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Issue dated - November 1973
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 The establishment of the Company's new Public Affairs Branch made significant progress at the first meeting of its Division heads with Regional Public Relations Managers at an October 29 - 31 meeting at the Mont Gabriel of Lodge in the Laurentians.
Held under the chairmanship of Public Affairs Vice-President, Claude Taylor, the three-day sessions considered ways of building a more effective team relationship between the headquarters and field personnel.
Shown at the meeting are, seated from the left: Gerry Giguere, Hal Cameron, Pierre Jerome, Don McLeod, Don Carlisle, Claude Taylor, Standing from the left: Tony Schoen, Dick Wedge, Al Godbold, André Gauthier, Martin Hendricks (of Personnel), Vic Leonard, George Chandler and VIad SIivitzky.
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 Scandinavian visit
Jack Kantor, Vice President-European Region made a recent "Thanks for your support" visit to Scandinavia recently, where he met with Copenhagen and Stockholm staff.
Shown at Copenhagen, are, from the left Miss Annette Hove, Kantor, Bill Ueshoefer, Miss Vibeke Friis-Jensen, Poul Erik Larsen, and Miss Aase Kaehne.
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 In this photo at Stockholm are, from the left: Bill Ulshoefer, Mrs. Maj Lagnerud, Kantor, Mrs. Gunilla Nyquist, Miss Catharina Wranne, Roland Nordgren, Bernt Berglund, and RoIf Syrten. |
 In 1972 the Company began a special travel service for Quebec Provincial Government personnel at the Ste. Foy ticket office in Quebec City. The service quickly outgrew its accommodations necessitating a move to more spacious quarters near the Airport. Settling into their new surroundings are, from the left: Passenger Agents Rock Cloutier, Suzanne Lessard, Lucette Tremblay, Bernard Legasse and City Ticket Office Manager Ghislain Tremblay. |
| Alan's Space - by Alan Rust |
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| Alan Rust |
Hummer's First Flight
Being aviation enthusiasts, I'm sure we can all relate to how important it is to make your first flight. Also for those flight instructors that work so hard to make the first flight take place we can take a moment to appreciate the patience of our instructors.
The video below shows both the patience of the instructor and the excitement of a first flight and follow up on flight training.
Click on image below to play video. (read full description for follow-up)
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| Rescued Baby Hummingbird |
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Canadi>n/CP Air/PWA, Wardair, etc. People & Events
- Compiled by Terry Baker |
 News and articles from days gone by gleaned from various publications from C.A.I.L. and it's "ancestry" of contributing airlines. |
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New services started in 1997
- March 3rd - Calgary-Los Angeles.
- April 3rd - Toronto-Buenos Aires
- April 6th - Vancouver and Toronto-Dallas Ft. Worth
- May 5th - Calgary-Chicago and Vancouver-Boston
The following is from www.ruudleeuw.com/search116.htm sent to us by Ken Bjorge.
The following information was provided by Aad van de Voet and Dirk Septer.
This is Bristol 170 Freighter Mk.31 CF-TFZ, c/n 13139, which was flying for Pacific Western Airlines at the time. It crashed there on 30 May 1956, only two months after PWA had acquired it..."
"It was one of the three originally purchased by Trans Canada Air Lines (later Air Canada). These aircraft were totally unsuited for this airlines requirements and were soon sold off to smaller Canadian operators.
CF-TFZ crashed on May 30, 1956 after only flying with Pacific Western Airlines for 2 months. It was damaged beyond repair after the undercarriage sank through the ice. Upon landing the port landing gear broke through the ice and the aircraft fell on its wing, bending the spars and crushing the sides of the fuselage.
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 Many off these Bristols had short careers with Canadian operators, mostly lost during landing accidents. For example Lambair, quoting Jack Lamb in his book 'My life in the North' (p. 151 ): "We operated four Bristol Freighters, and crashed four!"
It seems one was in service with them for only two months, while the second was lost after flying only 35 hours with them!
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Issue dated - January 1970
Extract from the "PWA Keeping posted" magazine -
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On December 17th (1969) Boeing's new commercial jet B747 landed at YVR. On the courtesy flight were the following PWA employees, Jack Cooke, Len Fraser, W.Bryan, Ken Bjorge, Sandy Welbourn, Dave Patterson and Russ Revel who enjoyed the opportunity to look over the huge aircraft.
Graduation ceremony PWA FLIGHT ATTENDANTS CLASS 5/69
The ceremony took place on October 28 at the President's office and a list of graduates follows: Vincent Cagnazzi; Gunter W. Lwowski; Ferruccio Susin; Clifford M. Young; Bonnie M. Airth; Dianne P. Bard, Ursula C. M. Conway; Claudia L. Morgan; Susan Turner; Jane D. Winter; Rebecca Henry; Cherry G. Shotton.
(Unfortunately there is no photo available - eds)
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Issue dated - February 1970
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 Here we have this photo of the Airport Terminal at Peace River, AB. |
| Reader's Feedback - Compiled by Terry Baker |
Every week we ask our readers for their stories or feedback on what they have read here in previous issues. Below is the feedback we have received recently.
George Brien sends in his memory of the people in the photo submitted by Betty Morgan -
Hi there
Re picture that Betty Morgan submitted-
Along with her husband Jack Morgan Regional Mgr, leading the group I recognize the following;
left to right - /Unknown/ Hank Holland YSJ/Gene Burdan YYT//Barry MacLure YQI/ Len Tardiff YQB Unknown/Art Russell YHZ/ Wendal Cooke YFC/ Bob Lennox? YHZ/ John Connolly YHZ/ Unknown/ Peter McCarthy YQY behind Paul Emmerson YHZ
cheers George
Betty Morgan has responded to those readers who sent in their emails with suggested names for those on the photo submitted in NetLetter nr 1168.
I think I knew most of the names of these men, I was just wondering how many of them might still be alive! I am amazed that there were so many who remembered them. But then, perhaps not all would have computers.
Only those in what used to be Air Canada's Pension dept. might know the answer to that question. Incidentally, those were great people to know. Jack was very fond of them all. Thanks to all who remembered and sent the names.
Dick Hovey sends us this information regarding the photo in NetLetter nr 1168 -
Your EIGHT men picture forgot to name John Eden between Mac MacLeod and Ken Rutledge. John was the Chief Engineer, Powerplant at the time. He was a Czech and one of the first graduates from the College of Aeronautics, Cranfield, Beds, UK after the war. There were a number of Cranfield grads in the company from the 50s to the last retiree in the past couple of years.
Dick Hovey, retired Chief Engr, Powerplant 91-94.
Dee Dee Lannon points our error in NetLetter nr 1169 -
Hi all,
I believe the picture of the lobster boil should read Saint John not St. John's as no one in the picture seems to have worked in YYT.
Keep up the good work.
Cheers,
Deedee Lannon,
retired AC
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Odds & Ends - Compiled by Terry Baker
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 Sometimes we receive articles and information that just doesn't fit in our other areas. This is where it goes! We have given the "girls" their say in the "Women in Aviation" recently, and the front end crew their say as well. Now its the turn of the Passenger Agents, from " Between Ourselves" magazine issued May 1956.
WHAT are your job qualifications? Here's what our Company jokingly says they should be:
"Preference given to college graduates with extensive knowledge of psychology, psychiatry, economics and politics. Agents at various times will be expected to speak French, English, German, Dutch and Russian. They will also be expected to know the dietary laws of the world's 20 main religions.
At all times be ready to answer questions regarding the distance from Pittsburgh to Walla Walla, the size of a propeller on a Convair. The location of the men's room at Warsaw airport.
An agent may not hit a passenger except in self defense. (If) it does become necessary to defend himself, the agent will use the official TCA 18-inch ruler. He/she will clobber the passenger with four quick blows over the skull, as described in paragraph 6, chapter 3, of the manual ...
The position of passenger agent provides glory, excitement, travel. days of glamor, nights of romance.
And when you are asked ... what your occupation is, you will answer, your hand shaking a little .. your lips twitching just slightly, but with pride in your quavering voice: 'I, sir? I am a passenger agent for TCA'."
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Terry's Trivia and Travel Tips - by Terry Baker
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| Terry Baker |
More user fees on the horizon?
Spirit to charge for boarding passes -
Florida-based Spirit Airlines, which has led the US airline industry in charging passengers fees for anything other than their low base airfares, has added another to its stable.
Beginning Nov. 1, Spirit said it will institute a new $5 charge for passengers asking agents to print their boarding pass at the airport.
Passengers who check in on-line or at an airport kiosk will not be charged the $5 fee, although next summer, even those checking in at kiosks will be charged $1. At the same time, Spirit said it will be lowering fares on all nonstop flights by $5 each way for travel on or after Nov. 1.
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 Riga - Latvian national airline airBaltic is the first airline in the world offering discounted tickets for passengers during the flight.
AirBaltic's travel store currently offers everything for your trip from flights, hotels, car rentals to insurance products, roses on board, phone cards and concert tickets. By selling tickets exclusively onboard, airBaltic secures discounted future flights to loyal customers. Tickets purchased onboard can be used for the next flight, or given as a gift to someone special.
Flight tickets will be on sale throughout June this year on all airBaltic flights. One-way flights cost starting from EUR 30, including airport fees.
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Smileys - Compiled by Terry Baker
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As we surf the internet and back issues of airline magazines we regularly find airline related jokes and cartoons. Below is our latest discovery.
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 This cartoon by Dave Mathias is from "Between Ourselves" issue October. |
 This cartoon by Jake Visser is from "Canadia>n Flyer" issued July 1997. |
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Disclaimer: Please note, that neither the NetLetter or the ACFamily Network necessarily endorse any of the airline related or other "deals" that we provide for our readers. We would be interested in any feedback (good or bad) when using these companies though and will report the results here. We do not (normally) receive any compensation from any companies that we post in our newsletters. If we do receive a donation or other compensation, it will be indicated as a sponsored article or link.
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We hope you have enjoyed this issue of the NetLetter, see you next week!
Sincerely,
Your NetLetter Team
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First published in October, 1995
- Chief Pilot - Terry Baker, Nanaimo, B.C.
- Co-pilot - Alan Rust, Surrey, B.C.
- Flight Engineer - Bill Rowsell, Londesboro, Ontario
To contact us, send an email to This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
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