On Saturday, May 14, 2022, Canadian fighter pilot legend Wing Commander James Francis Edwards of Nakomis, Saskatchewan passed away a month short of his 101st birthday. In the argot of aircrew from the Second World War, Stocky has “gone west.”

It is our tradition at Vintage Wings of Canada to offer up a story of an American aviator on the occasion of Thanksgiving, that most important of American holidays. Of course, we have Thanksgiving in Canada as well, but it is a full month and…

y name is Captain Chris Strawson and I have the privilege to explain to you the role of an Honourary Colonel in the Canadian Air Force and to discuss some of the many contributions HCol. Charley Fox made to 412 Squadron and the Canadian Forces….

It’s 6:30 in the evening in early October of 1943. Fred is strapping himself into a de Havilland Tiger Moth sitting on the short-cropped grass outside Hangar 3 at Number 13 Elementary Flying Training School St Eugene,…

Of the many photographs sent to me by the Houle family to help understand who Albert Ulric Houle really was, there is one that I keep going back to again and again. It is not a photograph of him in his uniform,…

The last time I saw Charley Fox, he was laughing and talking and laughing some more with his friends - all fighter pilots from the Second World War - men from the Greatest Generation….

On Wednesday, August 20th, 2008, Robert “Bert” Joss died suddenly at the age of 83. Bert, as we all knew him, was a great friend of Vintage Wings of Canada. He was a Fairey Swordfish pilot during the Second World War -…

If I had a dollar for every time someone asked me, during a tour of Vintage Wings of Canada or at an air show: “Whaddya call that bullseye thingamajig there?” or “How come the bullseye on the wing …

The weather on July 26th, 1944 was clear, warm, and windy from the Normandy coast all the way to Paris. It was a good day for hunting and 401 Squadron was up for the second time that day. Pushing closer and closer to Paris each day,…

Doug Warren,the last of the Second World War's Warren Twins, dies at age 89 in Comox, BC.

Born in Newcastle, England, McLarty moved to Buenos Aires as a boy. In response to Hitler's invasions, Don volunteered as an Argentine national for the Royal Canadian Air Force…

The first time I met Archie Pennie, he was 92 years old—a tall, slender and boney man in a blue on blue argyle sweater and powder blue trousers. His face was long and narrow, full of anticipation…

Back in 1991, working at Ottawa’s National Capital Air Show, I welcomed a young Rockwell B-1B bomber pilot as he stepped down from the ladder of his “Bone” after the long flight from Ellsworth ….

Yesterday, here in Ottawa, it was a typically hot and sweltering summer day, but it felt cold and hard. The cold of a long Canadian winter with no warmth in sight. When a good man dies, the numbness sinks deep…

Yesterday, here in Ottawa, it was a typically hot and sweltering summer day, but it felt cold and hard. The cold of a long Canadian winter with no warmth in sight. When a good man dies, the numbness sinks deep…

Harry Hannah was a Spitfire pilot during the Second World War. His story is like that of so many men and women of character from that time—it is both ordinary and extraordinary. It is ordinary in the sense that strange, extreme and …

In a world where “leadership” is commoditized and sold to us by life coaches, in professional development workshops and self-help books, one thing is clear — true leaders are born, not certified. Of course, certain aspects of leadership can be quantified and shared and even learned, but the true apex leader is one who …

La première fois que j’ai rencontré Archie Pennie, il avait 92 ans; un homme grand et mince revêtant un pull argyle bleu et un pantalon couleur bleu poudre. Il avait un visage long et étroit, des mèches de cheveux blancs fins…