Other formats

    TEI XML file   ePub eBook file  

Connect

    mail icontwitter iconBlogspot iconrss icon

The New Zealand Railways Magazine, Volume 13, Issue 8 (November 1, 1938)

[section]

The war bird is the natural defence warden of New Zealand. With an efficient air force, our land can be made into a veritable hornet's nest for any enemy, however imposing in strength, however resolute in attack. But there is a difficulty; it takes eight men on the ground to keep one aeroplane aloft. At present, as we stand to-day our eighty or a hundred pilots, and fifty to sixty planes require a total Air Force personnel of approximately seven hundred and fifty. Peace loving countries naturally only want to maintain their Air Forces at a strength that would just meet a sudden emergency. But as the recent flurry in “Insanity Fair” has just shown us, there is need for planning. In short, the Royal New Zealand Air Force is seeking to create a Civil Reserve of 5,000 New Zealanders; the men wanted are those whose trades or professions have given them the basic knowledge needed in building up a larger Air Force. Here is an opportunity for the skilled craftsman and the expert technician of all ages, to help in the best of all national causes, the defence of our hard won blessings of comfort, humanitarianism, and cultural progress.

(Photo., Chas. E. Brown.) Spitfire” wings along the Coast.

(Photo., Chas. E. Brown.)
Spitfire” wings along the Coast.

Of all the achievements of mankind in the last quarter of a century, the most awe-inspiring is the conquest of the air. It is a pitiful testament to human weakness that this newly-won mastery has been put to the crazy business of killing the sons and daughters of men, but when world-madness passes away, there will remain the shining marvel of man's ingenuity, daring, and endless patience.

The romance of flying goes a long way back in New Zealand, and it is surprising, to use an old-fashioned phrase “how time flies.” I can remember going into a tent at the Palmerston Winter Show in June, 1912, to see the Bleriot monoplane, the first machine that had ever actually flown. Mr. Reginald White, of Wellington, flew a locally built machine designed by Mr. Percy Fisher in May, 1913. The flights consisted of long hops of about 200 yards each and Pigeon Bush provided the flying ground. Before that again, Messrs. Schaeff and Fisher had got as far as some stray leaps in the air with an aeroplane built in 1910.

In 1907, Mr. B. Ogilvie had constructed a model triplane which was taken to England, and the “Winchester Aeroplane” created great interest, and was entered for the Baron de Forest Prize for the Channel flight. However, finances ran out, and this New Zealand design suffered the fate so common in those early pioneering days.

The first people to make an actual flying machine that flew in New Zealand were the Walsh Brothers, who built a Farman biplane, carrying out a good flight at Papakura in February, 1911.

These good New Zealanders, Messrs. L. & V. Walsh will go down in New Zealand flying history, for they went steadily ahead and formed the first flying school, training pilots for the Royal Flying Corps away back in 1915. It is interesting to remember that while they were on the job of building their first aeroplane they read of Bleriot's flight across the Channel.

I can remember the arrival home in New Zealand of Mr. J. J. Hammond, after winning fame in Northern Africa and England as an aviator.
Baffins of the Wellington (Territorial) Squadron, R.N.Z.A.F., flying over Wellington Harbour. (Photo Stevart & White Ltd.)

Baffins of the Wellington (Territorial) Squadron, R.N.Z.A.F., flying over Wellington Harbour.
(Photo Stevart & White Ltd.)

This was in 1914, and “Joe” Hammond, a blue-eyed Feilding boy, took up the first passenger in the Government's Bleriot machine, “Britannia,” and was asked awkward questions by the authorities. He had characteristically overlooked the necessity for obtaining permission for such a hazardous experiment.

Contemporaneous with him was that pioneer pilot, J. W. H. Scotland, who assembled a row of records in his Caudron biplane which he brought out in January, 1914.

He flew this machine in an epoch making journey from Invercargill to Gore, leaving at 6.50 p.m. and arriving at 7.38, thus attaining the terrific speed of 60 miles an hour. An interested spectator was the present Controller of Civil Aviation, Group Captain T. M. Wilkes.

page 13
(Photo. Stewart & White, Ltd.) Aircraft engineers carry out regular inspection and overhaul.

(Photo. Stewart & White, Ltd.)
Aircraft engineers carry out regular inspection and overhaul.

The story of these doughty heralds of the new dawn in transport methods would fill many volumes. The fine fact remains that New Zealanders were abreast of the world in this gesture of man's empire in every realm of nature. The Great War crashed all progress in aviation in New Zealand, as it crashed progress everywhere in so many other avenues of human endeavour. Even the modest “Britannia” Bleriot machine was shipped back to the Motherland, and our fliers did their deeds of daring in France and Mesopotamia. The fame of the late Squadron Leader M. C. McGregor, “Mad Mac” of “War Birds,” will never die. Great as were his war exploits, the real memorial to this great airman is the establishment of the present splendid system of commercial aviation, and, of course, his extraordinary achievement in the Melbourne Centenary Air Race.

After the war, New Zealanders who had gained their wings came back full of burning enthusiasm to make New Zealanders air-minded. Once again the scenic beauties of our “pocket world” interfered with the development of the new transport arm.

The clear but constant winds, the diversity of mountain and plain, and a hundred and one other possessions of our land which delight the tourist and bedevil the technician, conspired to slow up all progress. We must not forget Wigram aerodrome, the first to be constructed in New Zealand by that enterprising pioneer, The Canterbury Aviation Company. Nor must we forget R. L. Wigley's formation of the “New Zealand Aero-Transport Company,” in 1920. In a D.H.9 ‘plane with a Siddeley Puma engine, he and his pilot established a record flight from Invercargill to Auckland in a flying time of 8 hours 53 minutes.

(Photo. Stewart & White, Ltd.) Vildebeeste torpedo bombers of the R.N.Z.A.F.

(Photo. Stewart & White, Ltd.)
Vildebeeste torpedo bombers of the R.N.Z.A.F.

But New Zealand did not become really “air-minded” until that great figure “Smithy,” the deathless Australian, Sir Charles Kingsford Smith, flew the Tasman. His missionary work up and down New Zealand set the fashion, and aero clubs sprang up in every centre. Please be reminded that New Zealand has provided its share of world aviation figures.

The list is long, but the Blenheim-born Flying Officer Clouston, and the dazzling figure of Jean Batten, give us high rank in the countries who have produced “aces.”

From 1928 onwards, development in New Zealand was so rapid as to be exciting.

We have now over 600 pilots, and 55 licensed aerodromes. The Aero Clubs flying year ended with 1,805,138 miles flown.

It is claimed, moreover, that to-day, in proportion to population, New Zealanders are the greatest users on earth of passenger ‘planes.