John's Arrival

Didn't you used to hate these puzzles!

Jerome S. Meyer.  More Fun for the Family.  New York:  Greenberg:  Publisher, 1938.

Junkers W33/34

Jet Tales.  The Lufthansa Magazine.  5/81

This aircraft represents the prototype for the modern all-metal, low-wing, cantilever airliner.  It went into service by Lufthansa in 1928.  When equipped with floats, it could be used as a seaplane.  In 1928 a W33 named the Bremen made the first successful east-to-west crossing of the Atlantic, concluding the trip with a forced landing on Greenly Island, Quebec.  In the same year another W33, the Ural, made two flights from Berlin to Siberia to test conditions for a regular service to the Far East.  In 1930, this type was used for an air expedition to Baghdad.  The same year, Lufthansa engaged in midair refueling tests with this model, with a Fokker Grulich transferring fuel to a W33 via a 20-metre-long hose (although, wisely, water was used for the first test).  The W34 used a radial engine, versus the W33's six-cylinder, in-line Junkers L-5 engine.  By 1935, five of the later models were being used by Lufthansa on airmail routes to South America.

National Aeronautical Collection, Ottawa

Below the aircraft pictured above now on display in a diorama at the Canada Aviation Museum in Ottawa.

Keep mum, she's not so dumb!

The new Imperial War Museum.  London:  Imperial War Museum, 1989, Revised 1990, 1992.

Made in Japan

Sony's first offerings:

Above photos from Akio Morita, with Edwin M. Reingold and Mitsuko Shimomura, Made in Japan.  Akio Morita and Sony.  New York:  E.P. Dutton, 1986.  This book is a fascinating read, tracing Sony's humble beginnings in bombed out  Japan as the Tokyo Tsushin Kogyo (Toyko Telecommunications Engineering Company) to the international giant it was to become.  

New York Times, May 1968

Morita explains the many differences between Japanese and American approaches to business philosophy.  In particular, he stresses the importance of mottainai (pronounced "moat-tie-nigh") which "is an expression that that suggests that everything in the world is a gift from the Creator, and that we should be grateful for it and never waste anything.  Literally, mottainai means 'irreverant,' 'impious,' but more deply it carries the notion of sacrilege atainst heavy.  We Japanese feel that all things are provided as a sacred trust and actually are only loaned to us to make the best use of.  To waste something is considered a sin..  We even use the expression mottainai to refer to the profligate waste of something simple, even water or paper."

Amazingly, he reports that no single American company was initially interested in Sony's compact disc player technology.  He adds, "Ironically, some of the technology that made this new recording breakthrough possible was pioneered in the United States, but American companies nowadays seem more interested in service industries than in turning new technologies into attractive products that will be enjoyed by a vast number of consumers.  A theme I feel must be struck over and over again is the danger to America of exporting its production.  Rather than devoting their attention to making products competitive over the long haul, many American managers are still prone to looking for good merchandise at the lowest prices to produce quick profits."

At another point (remember, this was in 1986) he writes, "We Japanese do not feel comfortable with the kind of wide open, frontier spirit deregulation that the United States went through in the early eighties, when banks and savings and loan associations went into freewheeling promotion and many collapsed and the government had to bail them out with public money.  We are also worried about America's over-extension of credit and the huge deficits the U.S. has built up."

Finally, he concludes, "I have written earlier, maybe not with too much sympathy, about how many American businessmen must run their businesses with greater and greater profit foremost in mind, always with the fear that their stock price may drop if their quarterly dividends do not show constant improvement.  In this atmosphere, when the pursuit of profit gets stronger and stronger, managers are forced to seek the easiest ways to make a profit.  Two dangerous things have happened:  some mangers have found they can make more money more easily by trading money rather than goods; others have found that manufacturing where the cost is cheapest gives them the best chance to show profits quickly, even if it means moving production offshore.  

     "This phenomenon is leading to what I call the hollowing out of American industry.  America's industrial establishment is being reduced to a mere shell, and the same is happening all over Europe.  The world economic situation has slipped out of our control; increasingly, our economies are at the mercy of financial opportunists.  Entire companies have become objects of exchange for the money traders, and great, old businesses are eating up their own assets in pursuit of quick profits.  Some nations are crushed under debt burdens they cannot hope to liquidate.  And as some industrialists invest in the money trading game instead of the future, the ability of some countries to produce their industrial necessities is diminishing rapidly.  None of this activity is helping to create the better, more stable world we say we want."

Akio Morita passed away in 1999.

Ducati Flattracker

Beechcraft propeller

Antique store on Queen St. Toronto.

I think that's a great logo for a Tshirt.



The End of Snowy Owl Squadron

Larry Milberry.  Aviation in Canada.  Toronto:  McGraw-Hill Ryerson Ltd., 1979.

Following VE day, eight RCAF bomber squadrons consisting of 165 Lancasters were send back to Canada to assist in the war against Japan.  After they arrived home, Japan capitulated before they could be assigned to their new task.  Number 420 (Snowy Owl) Sqdn had its aircraft struck of strength, and their final trip was from Debert, Nova Scotia to Winnipeg, Manitoba.  Larry Milberry relates:

"On September 24 the squadron took off for the final leg of its trip.  Destination was Pearce, Alberta, from where the Lancasters were to be sold off or destroyed.  This leg has been described by one participant as 'how World War II came to the Prairies.'  Once out of Winnipeg, the gaggle of Lancasters set about terrorizing the countryside between there and Pearce.  Aircraft, even as big as they were, flew under telegraph wires; one, flew so low it over a farm, it collided with a barnyard duck.  Another pilot buzzed a train and recalls his last impression as seeing the startled look of disbelief on the engineer's face as he pulled down his blind!"

On arrival at their final destination, the planes were sold for scrap, although some were also burned on site.  Trainers were offered in flyable condition.  $800 would buy you a Cornell or a Crane.  For $900 you could walk away with a Harvard.  Anson V's sold for  $5000, and a Canso (PBY Catalina to Americans) commanded $25,000.

Milberry continues:

"Since this aircraft disposal process was shortlived, it didn't receive too much publicity.  Some articles appeared decrying the colossal waste.  One Winnipeg Free Press article was headlined, 'Aircraft Are Suffering Post-War Let-Down Too,' and read in part, 'Where blue-clad mechanics and armourers used to swarm around her on the tarmac servicing and bombing up for the next flight, now chickens roost on her tailplane, cows scratch their backs on her rudder and the farmer's dog lies out of the sun beneath her wings.

     'It's getting to be almost a common sight now--one that would have caused a minor sensation a few years back--to see one of these big yellow bombing trainers taking up space between the barn and the farmhouse.'

     'Barnyard bombers' were well worth the fifty dollars asking price.  To begin with, a farmer could count on recouping his investment by simply draining gas and antifreeze from his plane.  Tires were just fine for a farm wagon.  A tailwheel fit the wheelbarrow.  For years to come the carcass would be a veritable hardware store of nuts and bolts, piping and wiring.  In the meantime it made a suitable chicken coop for storage shed.  One farmer converted the nose of his Anson into a snowmobile.  Bit Waco gliders were hauled away just for their packing cases.  The actual gliders were probably put to the torch."

Check your oil?

Time was, service station attendants used to check your oil while they filled your car with gas.  I remember because I used to do this as a teenager.  We also used to check tire pressures.  Actually, neither service made sense since, to be accurate, both engine oil (for wet sump engines) and tire pressure should be checked when the car hasn't been driven for a while, not when it has just pulled in for gas.  This ad is from 1965.  I guess we know better now, since gas stations don't do this anymore.  

For a company started in 1901, the collapse of the once might Gulf Oil was messy and painful, a story of sleaze and greed pitted against harsh economic realities. Read more here.  Progress is fine...

Making a cross-stick boomerang

Bernard S. Mason.  Boomerangs.  How to Make and Throw Them.  New York:  Dover Publications, Inc., 1974.  Originally published as Primitive and Pioneer Sports by A.S. Barnes & Company, 1937.

Originally published back when gasoline in cars was measured by dipping a wooden stick into the tank.

The author stresses:

"But there is another aspect of this sport that plays a most conspicuous role in its appeal--the making of the boomerang is as interesting as the throwing.  In fact the making and the throwing are inseparably related in the the full enjoyment of the pastime.  There is pleasure in throwing a boomerang that is purchased or obtained from some one else, but it is in no respect comparable to the joy and thrill that results in handling one which you yourself have made.  All the time the boomerang is being whittled you are looking forward to throwing it--constantly in your mind is the question, 'Will it come back?'  And when the last chip has been removed you hasten to hurl it--and it works!  There is thrill and glowing satisfaction as can come from few other pastimes!  Even the old-timer at the boomerang game never fails to experience it; he may have made a thousand boomerangs, yet each time he throws a new one and it works perfectly just as he planned that it should,  he feels a surge of pride and satisfaction that is worth many times over the effort required for the making.  It is a feeling of craftsmanship, of having been the cause!"

Wooden Colonist Car

D.M.L. Farr, J.S. Moir, S.R. Mealing.  Two Democracies.  Toronto:  Ryerson Press, 1963.

No expense spared!  Yeah, right.  Not a pleasant way to travel.  See Colonist Cars.

Below, three ads enticing immigrants to come to Canada.  The top two are taken from William Kilbourn, The Making of the Nation.  A Century of Challenge.  (The Canadian Centennial Publishing Co. Ltd, 1965; Revised Edition:  McClelland & Stewart, 1973.)  The drawing for the Colonist Cars ad is clearly based on the photo above, with some artistic license.

 

Anthony Hocking.  Canada.  The Canada Series.  
(Toronto:  McGraw-Hill Ryerson Ltd., 1979).