The first airplanes in Quebec

In August 1907, a young 15 years old American boy named Larry Lesh accomplished, in the Port of Montreal and in Dominion Park, the first gliding flights in Canada. His No.1 glider managed a series of flights by being pulled by a horse. A second glider was also constructed. Pulled by a motor-boat, Lesh managed a flight of about 10 kilometres (6.2 miles) over the St-Lawrence river. The flight lasted 24 minutes, but the prototype was destroyed upon landing. In 1908, Lesh built a third glider, which disintegrated in flight, and he broke a leg in this accident.

Five years and two months after, the historical flight of the Wright brothers in North Carolina on February 23, 1909 – an experimental biplane named “Silver Dart” took-off from the frozen surface of a lake near Baddeck, Nova Scotia: it was the first flight of a powered heavier-than-air machine in Canada. The craft, piloted by Canadian John McCurdy, was the fourth prototype built by the Aerial Experiment Association, a group led by Alexander Graham Bell, the well known inventor of the telephone. Five months later, on July 25th 1909, the Frenchman Louis Blériot managed in Europe the first crossing of the English Channel aboard a flimsy monoplane which he had built himself, the Blériot XI. This achievement resulted in an unprecedented media coverage, thus putting aviation definitively on the map and saving the Blériot aircraft factory from bankruptcy. Overnight, the order book of all aircraft factories was filled up.

So, aeronautical demonstrations and air pageants multiplied and moves crowds all over. It is in this context that Quebecers heard their first roar of airplanes. In fact, from June 25 to July 5, 1910, an aviation week called “the world’s greatest aviation meeting” took place in Pointe-Claire in West Island Montreal. This was the first event of its type to take place in Canada, and had a fantastic success attracting up to 20,000 visitors per day. Among the 15 aviators and aeronauts present, four American pilots had been sent by the Wright brothers organization in order to extol the virtues of the Wright biplanes. One of these, the renowned Walter Brookins, holder of the world altitude record (5460 feet), has the honor of being the first pilot to have flown an aircraft in Quebec, on June 25th 1910. The sensation seekers were certainly well rewarded: a number of parachutists were launched from hot air balloons, a few aircraft ended in the scenery, and a dirigible crashes after a failed take-off…

But the big star of the week was undoubtedly the Frenchman Jacques de Lesseps who, barely a month before, had been the second to fly across the English Channel, also aboard a Blériot XI. On July 2nd, de Lesseps triumphantly flew over the City of Montreal, a perilous circuit of about sixty kilometres which he accomplished in precisely in 49 minutes… and three seconds. No Quebecers participated yet in any of these achievements. However, during the three previous years, a Belgian born Montrealer by the name of Achille Hassens, is fixing up a curious aircraft with four propellers, as well as with a monoplane baptized “La Montrealaise”. Unfortunately, the prototype was demolished on October 22nd 1910 during a test flight in Champlain Park.

On December 28 1911, a Montrealer, Percival Hall Reid executed four flights in a Blériot; however, the last one ended in a crash. This episode convinced him to enroll in a New York flying training school, becoming one of the first two Quebecers to earn a pilot’s license, the other being F.A. Wanklyn, also from Montreal. In September 1912, a crowd of over 100,000 people had gathered in Lafontaine Park in Montreal in order to witness a planned flight of a Burgess-Wright biplane to be flown by the American George Gray. However, Gray decided to cancel the demonstration. As a result, the crowd demonstrated its anger, and Gray had to be protected by the police.

In 1914, Jean-Marie Landry, a young automobile mechanic from Quebec City, went over to France in order to train as a pilot at the Blériot School. In so doing, he became the first French-Canadian, and only the seventh Canadian, to become officially licensed as a pilot. Back in this country, the citizens of Quebec City marveled at his aerobatics prowess. In 1918, the intrepid Landry flew under the Quebec Bridge just as the inaugural convoy was about to enter the bridge. For one dollar, Landry repeated the same with a passenger. His face as well as that of his wife, who accompanied him on many of his flights, are the center piece of the logo of the Foundation Aerovision Quebec.