country at that time was chiefly involved with the gold mining industry, which was thriving in the 1920s. In November 1926, Parer set up the Bulolo Goldfields Aeroplane Service Ltd there, and was the first pilot to fly over the Owen Stanley Range. He spent fifteen years flying in New Guinea. In 1934, he participated in the MacRobertson Air Race from England to Australia, this time teamed with Geoff Hemsworth, flying a Fairey Fox. They departed on 20 October 1934, arriving at the destination, Melbourne, on 13 February 1935. Parer then returned to New Guinea. However the advent of World War II and the impending Japanese invasion of New Guinea in 1942 found him once again in military service, this time in the Royal Australian Air Force. Due to his health he was made a reservist, and since he could not fly he turned to the sea. He was an engineer aboard the Melanesia, which delivered supplies and undertook reconnaissance along New Guinea's northern coastline. After the war he purchased a ketch in Darwin, and embarked in pearl exploration in the Torres Strait. From 1949 to 1951, he skippered a barge for the Department of Works around the Papua New Guinea coast. He then worked as an engineer on tourist vessels around the Great Barrier Reef in Queensland. From 1956 to 1958, he returned to Papua New Guinea to work on boats in the oil exploration industry. He spent the last years of his life running two small farms at Mount Nebo, Queensland. Parer married divorcee Ethel Blanche Jones on 30 December 1941. They were divorced on 8 May 1950 and he remarried to Mary Patricia Ross, but that marriage also ended in divorce. He had one son. Footnotes References Affleck, A. H., The Wandering Years, Melbourne, 1964 Eustis, N., The Greatest Air Race: England–Australia, 1919, Adelaide, 1969 Wixted, E. P., The North-West Aerial Frontier, 1919-1934, Brisbane, 1985 External links Isaacs, K., "Parer, Raymond John Paul (1894–1967)", Australian Dictionary of Biography, Volume 11, Melbourne University Press, 1988, pp. 133–134 Tom Campbell Black 75th Anniversary of the Great Air Race October 1934 Tom Campbell Black 1894 births 1967 deaths Australian aviators Aviators from Melbourne Australian people of Spanish descent Engineers from Melbourne Australian Army soldiers Australian Army officers Royal Australian Air Force officers Australian World War I pilots Royal Australian Air Force personnel of World War II Australian sailors Recipients of