21 November 2007

I just received the November issue of "The Observair" the house journal of the Ottawa Chapter of the CAHS. nice colour section of Beavers! Their Chairman Timothy Dubé generously granted me permission to reprint Stephen Fochuk's remarks on my lecture, for those that missed it. Thanks to Stephen for his kind words.

There was a belated birthday celebration at the Canada Aviation Museum on the evening of Thursday, 25 October 2007, and more than 70 members and guests of the Ottawa Chapter of the Canadian Aviation Historical Society (CAHS) were ready to party!  To help celebrate the recent 60th Birthday of the de Havilland Canada DHC-2 Beaver, the CAHS Ottawa Chapter had invited one of the acknowledged experts on the Beaver, Neil Aird from Kingston, to share some of his many images and stories of the great Canadian aeroplane.  For the past 21 years, Neil Aird has collected historical details and images of the DHC-2 Beaver; the results displayed on his website: http://www.DHC-2.com  CAHS Ottawa members and guests were treated to just a very small sampling of ‘eye candy’ from the site.

As the Chairman Timothy Dubé noted when introducing Neil, the first flight of the de Havilland Canada DHC-2 Beaver was 16 August 1947; now just over sixty years ago.  In 1980, after a long, useful service life, that first aircraft, CF-FHB, was flown into the Canada Aviation Museum and today it sits on the Museum’s main floor just outside our meeting place in the Bush Theatre.  Other examples of this sturdy radial-engined and, more recently, turbine-engined aircraft, fitted variously with wheels, skis, or floats, continue to get people into and out of the remotest locations around the globe today.  Recording the living history of the DHC-2 Beaver in images and words is Neil Aird’s ‘passion.’

Neil’s passion for documenting aircraft began at the age of 12, when he first started recording aircraft registrations in his native Scotland.  Neil never lost that childhood passion and in 1986, having moved to Canada and having always wanted to conduct extensive research on a specific aircraft type, he fixed on the de Havilland Canada DHC-2 Beaver.  There were several reasons why Neil chose the Beaver.  First, with 1,692 DHC-2 Beavers produced between 1947 and 1967, there was a manageable number of aircraft to research.  Secondly, Neil wanted an aircraft that was relatively easily accessible to him and, with as many as 900 still operating in North America, the Beaver again satisfied this requirement.

Today, 21 years later, keeping tabs on these Beavers takes up most of Neil’s time.  If you have ever wondered what happened to the aeroplane that you used to fly or the history of the one that you own today, Neil’s website DHC-2.com can probably provide the answer.  To date, there are 1,096 individual airframe histories on the website to consult, and 6,264 photographic images available for viewing.  New images and aircraft details come in almost daily from around the globe; 600 to 700 visit the website daily.  Neil said digital photographs are most welcome; slides and photographs require more work.  All are treated with imaging software like Adobe Photoshop.  An Excel spreadsheet, prepared by his friend Ian Macintosh, allows him to keep track of things.

When not working away at the website, Neil is usually on the hunt – camera in hand – to capture the DHC-2 Beaver in its natural habitat.  Sometimes these trips lead him to the far corners of world – like his trip to Australia in 2005 – and he had some wonderful images and experiences to share with people that night.  In most cases, being able to hitch a ride in a Beaver is one of the perks of the quest.  A highpoint this year was his cross-Canada flight from Kingston to Victoria in Viking Air’s recently re-built DHC-2 Turbo Beaver (c/n 979), C-GODH, “Olivia.”  Images and video from that flight were displayed.

In all, Neil treated members and guests to some 317 images from his website that night.  Included were many ‘Then’ and ‘Now’ images and stories.  As Neil said, almost half of the entire DHC-2 Beaver production was purchased by the U.S. armed forces for liaison, light transport, and ambulance duties, under the designation L-20 (later U-6).  Others were sold to military and government air arms around the world.  Many of these military Beavers, re-manufactured and in some cases re-engined, lead second, equally active, civilian lives today.  Obtaining information about their movements is sometimes easy to acquire, and sometimes it is not.  Again a sampling from the website served to illustrate his points.

For the last few years, Neil has prepared a DHC-2 Beaver calendar for sale.  The 2008 DHC-2.com Calendar illustrates fourteen different DHC-2 Beavers operating in Canada, the United Kingdom, and New Zealand.  Members and guests were able to purchase copies of the 2008 calendar for a special price that evening.

Always on the hunt for new DHC-2 Beaver images, Neil reminded everyone to keep their cameras handy; you never know when a hard working Beaver will fly into view.  As well, what might be a daily scene for you, is a delight for others today, and will be history tomorrow.  To Neil, we extend our thanks for making history so enjoyable!

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Stephen M. Fochuk
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