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Grant McConachie
It was the most powerful aircraft in Canada flying on floats. The visionary pilot at the controls was man who would make trans - Pacific flying commonplace in years to come. But on July 5, 1937, he was flying his giant Ford Trimotor 12-passenger aircraft to Whitehorse. An aviation first was in the making.
Grant McConachie was at the controls on that July day back in 1937. Twelve passengers were on board, but only one was paying. The others were on a freebie promotional flight from Edmonton to Whitehorse. The giant plane left the Edmonton float-plane base at 8:15 a.m. Fuel stops were scheduled for Fort St. John, Fort Nelson and Lower Post. It was a rough flight with severe headwinds reducing the air speed at times to 70 miles an hour, compared with the much ballyhooed plan to fly at an incredible 100 miles an hour.
The headwinds eased off, and the United Air Transport plane and passengers pulled into the White Pass docks on the
Yukon River at 11p.m. The first commercial flight from Alberta to the Yukon took 15 hours. More important to the new airline company than the non-paying passengers was the 400 pounds of mail it carried for the Canadian post office. The company could survive with the mail contract.
Next day in Whitehorse, the brash young McConachie decided to fly on to Dawson City and establish it as a destination for United Air Transportation. The company flew on a shoestring budget until 1939, when it added a few more planes to its fleet.
That year, it changed its name to Yukon Southern Air Transport Limited. Also that year, the Ford Trimotor float plane used in the first flight to the Yukon was rammed by a runaway Hurricane aircraft while it sat on the tarmac in Vancouver. The plane was damaged beyond repair. McConachie sued the Canadian military and won a cash settlement of $52,000.
Still cash-strapped, McConachie decided to approach the Canadian Pacific Railway and offer them a partnership in Yukon Southern. On January 13, 1941, the CPR announced the purchase of the company, and Canadian Pacific Airlines was born. Grant McConachie's role as an international aviation pioneer was just beginnning.
A CKRW Yukon Nugget by Les McLaughlin
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Two men standing by a Ford tri-motor plane (CF-AZB) in the snow. Date: ca. 1930.
Yukon Archives. Claude & Mary Tidd fonds, #8298.
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Grant McConachie, CPA President at Fort Norman, June 1942.
Yukon Archives. Finnie Familiy fonds, #8.
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Reconnaissance party northward-bound from Fort McMurray 7 June 1942. Grant McConachie CPA President is in centre.
Yukon Archives. Finnie Familiy fonds, #4.
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Pattullo annexes the Yukon
In my search for Yukon Nuggets, stories from our fabled past, I have often come across strange - sometimes bizarre - tales.
Most recently, a story surfaced for which I have no explanation, nor could I find anything to prove the event actually occurred except to tell you that it was a feature article in that most trustworthy of publications, Time Magazine.
Here as
Robert Service would say, are the simple facts of the case - as written on May 10th, 1937. I leave it to you to judge the truth of the tale.
We have heard in previous Nugget broadcasts how Duff Pattullo, once Premier of British Columbia, got his start in politics during his eight-year stay in Dawson City at the turn of the 19th century. He was in Dawson during the gold rush and beyond, became a Member of the Yukon Territorial council and speaker of the Legislature. When he left the Yukon in 1908, he was elected to the BC legislature and subsequently became Premier in 1933. That job lasted ten years. Pattullo always had an interest in the Yukon. As it turns out that interest was more than nostalgia for his earlier political days in the Territory.
Pattullo wanted to take the Yukon with him when he left and, according to the Time Magazine story of May 10th, 1937, he did just that. In that issue, Time reported that "BC Premier Duff Pattullo announced last week that British Columbia had closed a deal with the Government of Canada to take over Yukon Territory."
Time Magazine went on to say that "As soon as British Columbia's Legislature signs on the dotted line, that province will become, next to Quebec, the largest in Canada. From maps of Canada, said Time, "will disappear the colorful Yukon Territory, made famous by the discovery of gold in 1896 and the hairy-chested poems of
Robert William Service."
"Yukon's sole representative in the Dominion Parliament since October 1935 has been
Mrs. George Black, a dashing woman who left Chicago to join the gold rush of 1898."
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Time reported that
Mrs. Black exploded angrily last week when Premier Pattullo announced his acquisition and expressed "surprise" that no statement had been made "either in Parliament or by the Prime Minister."
Time continued: "By no means reluctant was the Dominion to surrender control of the Yukon, which has cost it nearly eleven million dollars for its development with almost no direct return to Ottawa. Cheerfully, said Time, the federal Government consented to make an annual grant to British Columbia of $125,000 for five years to help meet the expense of taking over.
So what to make of this story. We know that the Yukon did not join BC back in 1937. What we don't know is where they got the information of how close the federal government came to handing the Yukon over to British Columbia in 1937.
A CKRW Yukon Nugget by Les McLaughlin
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