No Englishmen Need Apply

Gordon Mallett
Released July 2010.
160 pages, 8.5x11, spiral bound.
Colour C$ 35.00 [ISBN 978-1-897391-59-4 ].
B&W C$ 19.00 [ISBN 978-1-897391-60-0].

No Englishmen Need Apply is a detailed study of the career of Major R. W. (Walter) Hale with the Canada Post Office Department and the events that led to him becoming widely known as the flying postal inspector. The British émigré’s early life adventures and military service in both World Wars also receive mention. Special attention is paid to the active role he played in the inauguration of air mail service throughout his adopted country’s vast northlands, most particularly the Great Bear Lake region and the ‘Mackenzie River corridor’ (the Athabaska/Slave/Mackenzie waterway linking Fort McMurray and Aklavik).

By the end of his lengthy career District Postal Superintendent Hale had logged more than seven hundred hours in the air, often flying to far-northern outposts in hazardous winter weather. He flew with many of the pioneer aviators including legendary bush pilots W. R. “Wop� May, C. H. “Punch� Dickins and G.W.G. (Grant) McConachie. Their signatures appear alongside his on a number of air mail covers illustrated in the book.

The biography’s storyline is presented in two formats: a 160-page text and photo narrative supported by material taken from primary references, and a parallel account recorded on a companion DVD. [Note: The DVD content is formatted for use in a computer, not a television VCR.] The signed covers and the human interest stories linked to their carriage are the main focus of the study. Reference numbers in the narrative direct the reader to supporting textual and pictorial material in the Appendices and Additional Notes sections and on the disc. The rationale for the choice of the biography’s unusual title is explained. Foremost among the more than 300 files on the disc are scans of vintage photographs in an album entitled Mackenzie River District Air Mail Service that Hale assembled in the mid-1930s. Scans of the biographer’s collection of Hale-signed covers are also included.

Gordon Mallett’s interest in philately and aviation dates back to his youth when he was an enthusiastic stamp collector. One day his father showed him a number of black-and-white snapshots he had taken of pioneer air mail pilot W. R. “Wop� May perched atop his Lougheed Vega monoplane, CF-AAL. Gordon was soon reading everything he could find about early aviation. These interests heightened in his adult years and by the early 1980s he had become an avid aerophilatelist. Gordon's three Aerophilatelic exhibits, “Canada’s Love Affair with Katherine Stinson", "Birdboy and Birdgirl in Japan� and “Three Weeks in December 1928�, also focus largely on the human interest side of philately and aviation. He is actively involved in the Canadian Aerophilatelic Society (CAS) and will be part of a joint BNAPS Airmail Study Group-CAS seminar at BNAPEX 2010 in Victoria.