At the September 6th meeting, our guest speaker was Malcolm Kelly. Malcolm has been a
professional sports and news journalist and a writer for over 37 years. Additionally, he is a
Professor in the sports journalism program at Centennial College in Toronto. He gave us a fascinating, spirited, and engaging talk on one of his many interests in military history – the dangers of early aviation in the 1930’s and 1940’s and the fascination that becoming a flier held for young men and women of the era.
Malcolm peppered his comments with information about the likes of the R100 Airship of 1930;
Amy Johnson; Wop May; Amelia Earhart; Harold Elwood Morrow (of Peterborough); the influence of the popular comic literature of the times, movies and the Biggles books that occasioned youngsters to view aviation as a romantic and noble undertaking.
Coincidentally, as he talked, it turned out that some members in the audience not only had memories of the events being described but even personal, and sometimes emotional, connections to such events.
All in all, a fascinating and informative visit back to the remarkable aviators of WWII and their contributions. Malcolm ended by reading the famous poem “High Flight” by John Gillespie McGee, a fitting insight into romance and danger that was the lot of many young pilots and navigators of the Royal Canadian Air Force in WWII.
High Flight
Oh! I have slipped the surly bonds of Earth
And danced the skies on laughter-silvered wings;
Sunward I’ve climbed, and joined the tumbling mirth
of sun-split clouds,—and done a hundred things
You have not dreamed of—wheeled and soared and swung
High in the sunlit silence. Hov’ring there,
I’ve chased the shouting wind along, and flung
My eager craft through footless halls of air ….
Up, up the long, delirious, burning blue
I’ve topped the wind-swept heights with easy grace
Where never lark nor ever eagle flew—
And, while with silent lifting mind I’ve trod
The high untrespassed sanctity of space,
Put out my hand, and touched the face of God.