undeveloped country that would take weeks to cross by canoe, dog team, horseback, or on foot. Resource companies thrived with the ability to move personnel and material year round. Particularly important was winter flying, in conditions so cold that oil had to be drained from engines and kept indoors overnight, then preheated and poured back in. Skis and floats were as useful as wheels for northern fliers. These flights were made under the most primitive of conditions, often with no prepared airfields, no reliable weather forecasts, no radio or visual navigation aids, poor maps, and often no indoor facilities for repairs. Today the Canadian Bushplane Heritage Centre museum records some of the key events of this time. Bush flying in Canada began immediately after the First World War, using war surplus aircraft for aerial photography and forest fire patrol. The Ontario Provincial Air Service used aircraft for forest fire surveillance and transport of fire fighters, and developed the water bomber for fire fighting. The bush pilot era produced such notable pilots as Wop May and Punch Dickins. In January 1929 Wop May's flight from Edmonton to Fort Vermilion, Alberta carrying diphtheria vaccine became a headline news story. Both May and Dickins, along with many other bushplane aviators, became founders of Canadian aviation businesses. Fred J. Stevenson barnstormed after the war, and flew in Manitoba and Northern Ontario. In 1927 he joined Richardson's Western Canada Airways and airlifted 14 men and of material in support of exploration at Fort Churchill. These flights were proof of the utility of aircraft in the North. He was killed in an air crash. Second World War The British Commonwealth Air Training Plan in Canada trained over 130,000 aircrew during the Second World War. Some of the facilities built for BCATP were used after the war in extending and improving civilian aviation. Canadian factories, far from the dangers of enemy attack, manufactured both training and combat aircraft. Since shipborne delivery was slow and vulnerable to attack, complete aircraft were flown in stages across a North Atlantic route to the European theatre of operations. Initial operations were organized by Canadian Pacific Air Lines, and the initial service was taken over by the RAF to become RAF Ferry Command. About 9000 aircraft were dispatched, and the operational experience gained became the basis for peacetime trans-Atlantic scheduled flights. The airport established at Gander, Newfoundland was a key element of