History of Nova Scotia
with special attention given to
Transportation and Communications

Chapter 17
1 January 1910   to   31 December 1919

Index with links to the other chapters

1910 February 21

A.G. Bell Travels to Nova Scotia

1910 Feb 23 --- Wednesday --- at BB (Beinn Bhreagh)
A.G.B.'s movements continued

Source: The A.G. Bell Family papers at the U.S. Library of Congress
Historical Collections for the U.S. National Digital Library
Page 90, low res:   http://memory.loc.gov/mss/magbell/338/33800101/0089.gif
Page 90, high res:   http://memory.loc.gov/mss/magbell/338/33800101/0089.jpg
Page 91, low res:   http://memory.loc.gov/mss/magbell/338/33800101/0090.gif
Page 91, high res:   http://memory.loc.gov/mss/magbell/338/33800101/0090.jpg

1910 February 23

Celebration of Anniversary of First Flight

1910 Feb 24 --- Thursday --- at BB (Beinn Bhreagh)

Source: The A.G. Bell Family papers at the U.S. Library of Congress
Historical Collections for the U.S. National Digital Library
Low resolution:   http://memory.loc.gov/mss/magbell/338/33800101/0093.gif
High resolution:   http://memory.loc.gov/mss/magbell/338/33800101/0093.jpg

1910, Feb. 25       Beinn Bhreagh Recorder       212
Social Aero Club of Beinn Bhreagh

Alexander Graham Bell Institute, University College of Cape Breton
Beinn Bhreagh Recorder, volume 3, page 212, February 25th, 1910
http://bell.uccb.ns.ca/cgi-bin/bbr.pl?Volume=3&Page=212

1910 February 25

First Flights of 1910

Flying Around Baddeck Bay, Nova Scotia

Quoted from Dr. Bell's Notebook
Feb. 25th, 1910, pages 95-96

1910 Feb 25 --- Friday --- at BB

Source: The A.G. Bell Family papers at the U.S. Library of Congress
Historical Collections for the U.S. National Digital Library
Low resolution:   http://memory.loc.gov/mss/magbell/338/33800101/0094.gif
High resolution:   http://memory.loc.gov/mss/magbell/338/33800101/0094.jpg

1910 Feb 25 --- Friday --- at BB

Source: The A.G. Bell Family papers at the U.S. Library of Congress
Historical Collections for the U.S. National Digital Library
Low resolution:   http://memory.loc.gov/mss/magbell/338/33800101/0095.gif
High resolution:   http://memory.loc.gov/mss/magbell/338/33800101/0095.jpg

1910, Feb. 28       Beinn Bhreagh Recorder       241
First Flights of 1910

Alexander Graham Bell Institute, University College of Cape Breton
Beinn Bhreagh Recorder, volume 3, page 241, February 28th, 1910
http://bell.uccb.ns.ca/cgi-bin/bbr.pl?Page=241&Volume=3

1910, Feb. 28       Beinn Bhreagh Recorder       242

Alexander Graham Bell Institute, University College of Cape Breton
Beinn Bhreagh Recorder, volume 3, page 242, February 28th, 1910
http://bell.uccb.ns.ca/cgi-bin/bbr.pl?Page=242&Volume=3

1910 February 26

Flying Over Baddeck Bay, Nova Scotia

1910, March 4       Beinn Bhreagh Recorder       243

In the above photo, the typing has been digitally enhanced
as much as I can manage. The bottom caption reads:
"McCurdy circum-droming Baddeck Bay in C.A.C.
aerodrome, Baddeck No. 2. Feb 26. Photo by
John McNeil."

"C.A.C.":   Canadian Aerodrome Company
"aerodrome":   airplane
"droming":   flying

1910 March 3

Flying Over the Ice 100 Feet in the Air

1910 Mar 4 --- Friday --- at BB (Beinn Bhreagh)
Beinn Bhreagh (pronounced ben vree-ah) — Gaelic for beautiful mountain —
was A.G. Bell's home near Baddeck, Cape Breton Island, Nova Scotia.

Source: The A.G. Bell Family papers at the U.S. Library of Congress
Historical Collections for the U.S. National Digital Library
Low resolution:   http://memory.loc.gov/mss/magbell/338/33800101/0139.gif
High resolution:   http://memory.loc.gov/mss/magbell/338/33800101/0139.jpg

Droming (Flying) Over the Ice 100 Feet in the Air

Testing of Aerodromes (airplanes) at Baddeck Going on So
Successfully That the Head of the United
States Signal Service Expresses His
Interest in the Experiments

McCurdy and Bell Describe the Flights

1910, March 3       Beinn Bhreagh Recorder       250
Morning Flight of Baddeck No. 2, Mar. 3

Alexander Graham Bell Institute, University College of Cape Breton
Beinn Bhreagh Recorder, volume 3, page 250, March 3rd, 1910
http://bell.uccb.ns.ca/cgi-bin/bbr.pl?Page=250&Volume=3

1910, March 3       Beinn Bhreagh Recorder       251

Alexander Graham Bell Institute, University College of Cape Breton
Beinn Bhreagh Recorder, volume 3, page 251, March 3rd, 1910
http://bell.uccb.ns.ca/cgi-bin/bbr.pl?Page=251&Volume=3

1910, March 3       Beinn Bhreagh Recorder       252

Alexander Graham Bell Institute, University College of Cape Breton
Beinn Bhreagh Recorder, volume 3, page 252, March 3rd, 1910
http://bell.uccb.ns.ca/cgi-bin/bbr.pl?Page=252&Volume=3

A comment about Dr. A.G. Bell's records (by I.C.S., 4 August 2001) Dr. Bell continually insisted on everyone keeping written records of any and all experimental work done each day. He spent a lot of his own time writing notes in his journal, and often he would nag others to be sure to write down notes describing what they had done and seen — within hours, while memories were fresh. This was a continual concern ("fanatical" and "obsessed" are a little too strong maybe, but not by much) of Dr. Bell. The Beinn Bhreagh Recorder is a prominent example of Bell's emphasis on the importance of keeping written records. He kept checking that these records were being made, and when he was dissatisfied he would sometimes expand the record himself by the device of a sort of cross-examination in which Bell asked questions and others would give answers, with the whole being written down as it occurred. Of course Bell's position, reputation and status were such that, when he took the time to ask a series of questions, everyone else took the time to give him the answers he wanted. An example of this cross-examination style of eliciting information is found on pages 97-101 of Dr. Bell's journal, dated Feb. 25, 1910, and written by Bell at Beinn Bhreagh, Nova Scotia. Bell wrote: "I don't quite get from the remarks of either Baldwin or McCurdy a picture of what occurred" so he proceeded to get the additional details that he wanted. Page 97 is reproduced below. This is a permanent record of a dialogue betweeen "A.G.B." (Dr. Bell) and "McC." (J.A.D. McCurdy): 1910 Feb. 25       Friday       at B.B. Source: The A.G. Bell Family papers at the U.S. Library of Congress Historical Collections for the U.S. National Digital Library Low resolution (faster downloading): Page 97:   http://memory.loc.gov/mss/magbell/338/33800101/0096.gif Page 98:   http://memory.loc.gov/mss/magbell/338/33800101/0097.gif Page 99:   http://memory.loc.gov/mss/magbell/338/33800101/0098.gif Page 100:   http://memory.loc.gov/mss/magbell/338/33800101/0099.gif Page 101:   http://memory.loc.gov/mss/magbell/338/33800101/0100.gif High resolution (better legibility): Page 97:   http://memory.loc.gov/mss/magbell/338/33800101/0096.jpg Page 98:   http://memory.loc.gov/mss/magbell/338/33800101/0097.jpg Page 99:   http://memory.loc.gov/mss/magbell/338/33800101/0098.jpg Page 100:   http://memory.loc.gov/mss/magbell/338/33800101/0099.jpg Page 101:   http://memory.loc.gov/mss/magbell/338/33800101/0100.jpg This concern, that detailed written records be made and kept, has left an extensive legacy of historical material that is hugely valuable to us today; it enables us to follow day by day and often hour by hour the actions and thoughts of the key participants in Bell's work. We know what was being done, by who and when, and what happened, all with the incomparable dependability of a record written at the time by the people on the scene. One might ask why Dr. Bell put so much effort into written records. A clipping from the Texas Dallas Morning News, May 21, 1939, tells of a remarkable event in 1878, when Bell's future telephone empire tottered on the brink of extinction in a lawsuit against the Western Union Telegraph Company. At the last minute, Bell's patents (and fortune) were saved by the lucky preservation and discovery of a crumpled and discarded sheet of paper with crucial notes. There is little doubt that this experience had a lot to do with Bell's later insistence on everyone keeping detailed notes. Clipping from the Dallas Morning News, May 21st, 1939 Source: The A.G. Bell Family papers at the U.S. Library of Congress Historical Collections for the U.S. National Digital Library Low resolution:   http://lcweb2.loc.gov/mss/magbell/999/99900101/0009i.gif High resolution:   http://lcweb2.loc.gov/mss/magbell/999/99900101/0009i.jpg This Dallas Morning News article is a lightly-edited version of promotional material distributed by the Twentieth-Century Fox movie studio, at the time of the release of the movie “The Story of Alexander Graham Bell” produced by Darryl Zanuck and starring Don Ameche as A.G. Bell, Henry Fonda as his assistant Thomas Watson, and Charles Coburn as his father-in-law Gardiner Hubbard. It is well known that the Hollywood movie companies take great liberties when dealing with historical events, and often hugely distort and even fabricate large chunks of history. Nobody accepts a Hollywood film as being a reliable source of accurate history. However, this story about the fortunate discovery of a vital document at the last minute appears to be true. It certainly is true that there was a no-holds-barred legal battle between Bell and Western Union. In the late 1870s, Western Union held a virtual monopoly of long distance communications in the United States. Western Union refused to buy Bell's telephony patents because it believed that one of its own employees held a patent for the telephone. Bell won the patent infringement lawsuit in 1879, giving him complete control of the telephone industry. Western Union was forced to sell its telephone network to Bell, as well as its Western Electric manufacturing concern in 1881. Source: Brief history of the International Telegraph Union http://www.cs.berkeley.edu/~gribble/cs39c/Comm/regulation/regulation.html On March 7, 1876, three days after the basic telephone patent had been issued, Bell had developed a working telephone. In the fall of 1876, Bell and his financial backers, Thomas Sanders and Gardier Greene Hubbard, a successful leather merchant and a prominent attorney, offered to sell their invention and patent to Western Union Telegraph Company for $100,000, but the offer was refused. On March 20, 1879, both the New England Telephone Company and the Bell Telephone Company were consolidated under the name National Bell Telephone Company. Western Union purchased the Gray, Edison and Dolbear patents and organized its own telephone company, the American Speaking Telephone Company. To counter this attack, the Bell Company leaders did two things. First, they hired a professional manager, Theodore N. Vail, to manage their organization. Second, they filed a lawsuit against Western Union for infringement of Bell's patents. On September 12, 1878, the Bell Company filed a suit in the Circuit Court of the United States, District of Massachusetts, against the giant Western Union Telegraph Company — technically against Peter A. Dowd, agent for the Western Union's telephone subsidiary — for infringement of the Bell patents. Western Union engaged George Clifford, a prominent patent attorney, as its chief counsel in the case. Western Union was forced into settlement. The settlement provided that Western Union withdraw from telephone service and sell its network and patents to the Bell Company. In return, Bell agreed to stay out of the telegraph business and to pay Western Union 20 percent of its telephone rental receipts over the 17-year life of their patents. This agreement added 56,000 telephones in 55 cities to the Bell Company. In 1909 AT&T bought 300,000 Western Union shares, enough to give it working control. In 1910 Vail became president of Western Union, making him president of both companies. Source: Telecommunications History http://www.geocities.com/ResearchTriangle/7360/section2.htm

1910 April 22

Maritime Telegraph & Telephone
Company Limited

One dollar per mile is equivalent to 62¢ per kilometre.

1910 May 27

Four-Dollar Bill

1910 June 27

Contract Signed for Railway from Dartmouth to Guysboro

Company backed by London capitalists
agree to operate road from Dartmouth to Guysboro
with branches to Country Harbor and Pictou County

• from Dartmouth to Guysboro 164 miles 264 km
• New Glasgow branch 40 miles 64 km, and
• the Country Harbor branch 12 miles 19 km.

• Notes (written 18 July 2000):
• The spellings "Guysboro" and "Guysborough" are shown above as printed in the Journal.
• The use of the word "road" when referring to a railway sounds strange to us, but in those days the term "road" often meant a railway. (The literal meaning of "railroad".)
• "Executive Council" or "Governor in Council" means the group usually called the provincial cabinet. Hon. Christopher P. Chisholm then was a member of the Executive Council (he was a cabinet minister).
• "Standard gauge" for railways was universally understood to mean the Stephenson Gauge of 4 feet 8½ inches 144 cm.
• This railway was bult from Dartmouth to Dean's, as planned, and was officially opened for regular operation on 1 January 1916. By 1916 it was owned by the ICR, and was formally named the Dartmouth Branch Extension of the Intercolonial Railway, but is usually known as the Musquodoboit Railway. It ran 69.3 miles 111.6 km from Dartmouth, through Eastern Passage, Lawrencetown, Three-Fathom Harbour, Seaforth, West Chezzetcook, Head of Chezzetcook, East Chezzetcook, Meagher Grant, and Middle Musquodoboit, to Upper Musquodoboit. Trains continued to operate over this line into the 1980s.

1910 June 28

MT&T Buys PEI Telco

1910 September 1

First Run of Rotundus

Certified for 250 passengers

1910 October 5

First Canadian Pilot's License

On this day, J.A.D. McCurdy became the first Canadian to obtain an aircraft pilot's license.
[Halifax Daily News, 5 October 1999]

On 19 August 1947, John Alexander Douglas McCurdy
was sworn in as Lieutenant-Governor of Nova Scotia.
He served in this office for about five years.

1910 October 10

10/10/10

1911

N.S. Carriage and Motor Car Co. Ltd.

1911 March 31

Blomidon Railway

On March 31, 1911, an act to incorporate the Blomidon Railway Company Limited was passed by the Nova Scotia Legislature. The act indicates that the new railway – to be built entirely within Kings County – would connect with the existing main line track of the Dominion Atlantic Railway at Wolfville, cross the Cornwallis River at Port Williams, and continue generally northward to Canning via Starr's Point and Canard.

At or near Canning there would be a connection with and crossing of the existing Cornwallis Valley Railway. The new Blomidon Railway would run northward from Canning, through Woodside, North Corner, Upper Pereau, and Delhaven. The plan was to build the track to the top of Cape Blomidon to the site of the National Park, and from there continue to Scott's Bay and then to Cape Split.

A serious proposition

Rumoured to have the blessing of Sir Frederick Borden, and with initial capital of a quarter million dollars, the plan to build the Blomidon Railway was far from a fanciful scheme. The act gave the Company two years from the date of incorporation to start work on the railway, but there is no known record of any significant construction work having been done. The Blomidon Railway was never built.

[Excerpted from Ed Coleman's column Looking Back: The Blomidon Railway
in the Kentville Advertiser, 9 April 1999.]

See: History of Railway Companies in Nova Scotia

1911 September 15

Deadline for Tenders for Construction of
Guysboro Railway

1911 September 15

Deadline for Tenders for Construction of
Musquodoboit Railway

1911 October 5

Tenders Accepted for Construction of
Guysboro Railway
and
Musquodoboit Railway

An Order-in-Council has been passed awarding the contracts for the extensions of the Intercolonial Railway in Nova Scotia for which money was unanimously voted by Parliament last June, and for which the tenders were received over a month ago. The lowest tenderer in each case is awarded the contract. The branch from Dartmouth to Deans will be built by M.P. Davis, and the Guysboro County line will be built by the Nova Scotia Construction Company. The Government in awarding the contracts have simply complied with the mandate of Parliament and have followed the usual procedure in concurring in the recommendation of the Departmental Engineers as to the lowest figures submitted by the various firms tendering.

1911 November 11

11/11/11

1912 April 15, Monday

Telegram: Titanic Disaster

Captain Rostron of Carpathia informs AP New York of Titanic disaster
Source: http://home.iprimus.com.au/oseagram/tgram.html

1912 April 17

Mackay-Bennett Departs from Halifax

1912 April 30

Mackay-Bennett Returns to Halifax

1912 June 24

Yarmouth Light and Power Company

1912 August 27

The First Trans-Canada Auto Trip

Departed Halifax:   27 August 1912
Arrived Victoria:   17 October 1912

1912 REO automobile
Source:
http://web.archive.org/web/19991008181915/stargate.vsb.bc.ca/autotour/vehicles.htg/reo320-2.gif

Earliest Drive Across Canada

Letter to Editor

1912 November 1

MT&T Begins 24-Hour Service in Kentville

1912 December 12

12/12/12

1913

Halifax - Bermuda Mail Service

1913

Marconi's Duplex TransAtlantic Radio Service

1913

700,000 tons of Coal produced in Pictou County

Fifty years ago a wilderness of scrubby birch and hemlock covered the site on which the town of Westville now stands, with a population of over 5000.  In the year 1854 prospectors began searching for coal, and discovered the outcrop of a seam on the north side of the town where the land slopes toward the Middle River.  The Black Diamond Company was the first to commence operations, and was soon followed by the Acadia, and in 1868 by the Drummond.  A railway was completed to Granton and later to Abercrombie, where there are wharves and all conveniences necessary for shipping coal.  The works of the Vale Colliery at Thorburn were started in 1872.  Thorburn is prettily situated and has a population of over 1200.  A railroad six miles [10km] long leading from the colliery to New Glasgow is in operation.  The total coal production in Pictou County for 1913 was 700,000 tons.
— Pictou in the Business World
Pictonians at Home and Abroad by Rev. J. P. MacPhie MA (1914)
Electric Scotland

1915

Canada's Principal Ports

1915 July

Amherst Concentration Camp

Ukrainian Canadians interned during World War One

House of Commons Debates
27 September 1991

Upon each individual's arrest, whatever valuables they might have had were seized. Some of this confiscated money was stolen. As early as 1915, General Otter wrote that "difficulties have arisen in accounting for the monies received".

1916

Radio Direction Finding Stations

1916 January 1

Musquodoboit Railway Opening Ceremony

1916 August 1

Chambers Electric Light & Power Company

1916 October - November

Mauretania at Halifax

World's Largest and Fastest Passenger Liner

1917

Mail Contract

We all can remember Jerry Morine, Wolfville Ridge/Port Williams, delivering the local mail in recent years.  You probably do not know that his grandfather, Jeremiah "Jerry" Morine, was the mail carrier for 1913 & 1917 (according to the contracts the family still have).

In the 1917 contract, Grandfather Jerry was to deliver the mail between Wolfville Post Office and Gaspereau 6 days a week for the grand total of $313.00 per year.  The contract expired in 1921.

Keep in mind that in the early 1900s, mail delivery was done by horse & wagon 6 days a week.

Jerry was to "Leave Gaspereau Post Office daily, Sundays excepted, at such hour as will ensure arrival half an hour before Postal Car train from Halifax is due and return after arrival of said train, performing trip either way in half an hour."  The computed distance was 2½ miles.  He also had to load & unload the mailbags.

The rate of travelling, "...five miles per hour including stoppages".

As a mail carrier, he was supplied with a Post Horn, which "...he is to sound distinctly on approaching and leaving a Post Office and occasionally along the road".

He was also to "...carry a side bag slung over his shoulder for reception of Way Letters and they shall receive all letters offered to the carrier by any individual on the route provided that when a letter is so offered the distance from the nearest Post Office exceeds one mile and deliver the same to the Postmaster at the first Post Office at which they may arrive stating to the said Postmaster where the said letters were received."

He would lose up to $10.00 for each instance he was unable to deliver the mail – bridges out, roads blocked did not matter.

— Submitted by Diana & Herby (another grandson) Morine

Source: excerpted from Gaspereau Valley Gazette, September 2010
      http://www.reddragonflydmc.com/GaspereauValleyGazette/PDFs/2010/GVGSept10.pdf

1917 April 3

Leon Trotsky Arrested at Halifax

On 3 April 1917, Lev Davidovich Bronstein (1879-1940) a.k.a. Leon Trotsky, was arrested by British authorities when the steamship he was travelling on docked at Halifax, Nova Scotia. Trotsky was held in detention in Nova Scotia for about four weeks, spending most of the time in a concetration camp in Amherst. At the end of April he was released and returned to Russia, where he quickly became prominent in Russian political affairs. He was leader, with Vladimir Ilyich Lenin, of the 1917 October Revolution, and architect of the Red Army. He was Soviet Commissar of Foreign Affairs 1917-1918 and Commissar of Military and Naval Affairs 1918-1924.

In his memoirs, Trotsky wrote: "The police left my wife and children in Halifax; the rest of us were taken by train to Amherst, Nova Scotia, a camp for German prisoners. And there, in the office, we were put through an examination the like of which I had never before experienced, even in the Peter-Paul fortress. For in the Czar's fortress the police stripped me and searched me in privacy, whereas here our democratic allies subjected us to this shameful humiliation before a dozen men ... Not until the next morning did the camp commander, Colonel Morris, in answer to our repeated demands and protests, tell us the official reason for the arrest. 'You are dangerous to the present Russian government,' he said briefly ... The Amherst concentration camp was located in an old and very dilapidated iron foundry that had been confiscated from its German owner. The sleeping bunks were arranged in three tiers, two deep, on each side of the hall. About eight hundred of us lived in these conditions. The air in this improvised dormitory at night can be imagined. Men hopelessly dogged the passages, elbowed their way through, lay down or got up, played cards or chess. Many of them practised crafts, some with extraordinary skill. I still have, stored in Moscow, some things made by Amherst prisoners. And yet, in spite of the heroic efforts of the prisoners to keep themselves physically and morally fit, five of them had gone insane. We had to eat and sleep in the same room with these madmen..."

Source: Excerpted from Chapter 23, "In a Concentration Camp"
My Life by Leon Trotsky, Charles Scribner's Sons, New York, 1930
Complete text of Chapter 23, "In a Concentration Camp" by Leon Trotsky
    http://ns1758.ca/quote/trotsky1917.html

1917 December 6   9:04:35am

The Halifax Explosion

1917 December 31

138 Rural Telephone Companies

1918 February 18

Imperial Oil Refinery
Begins Operating in Dartmouth

1918 October 31

Ravages of Influenza in Lunenburg

1918 November 19

Canadian National Railways

• In Nova Scotia, this order included:
• the Intercolonial Railway (the main line line track from Halifax through Rockingham, Bedford, Windsor Junction, Shubenacadie, Truro, Maccan and Amherst to Montreal)
• the Intercolonial Railway Mulgrave Branch (the track from Truro through Stellarton, New Glasgow and Antigonish to Mulgrave)
• the Intercolonial Railway Cape Breton Branch (the track from Point Tupper through McIntyre Lake, River Denys, and Orangedale, to Sydney)
• the Intercolonial Railway Pictou Town Branch (the track from Stellarton through Westville and Alma to Brown's Point and Pictou)
• the Intercolonial Railway Pictou Landing Branch (the track from New Glasgow through Trenton to Pictou Landing)
• the Intercolonial Railway Sunnybrae Branch (the track from Ferrona to Sunnybrae, in Pictou County)
• the Intercolonial Railway Dartmouth Branch (the track from Windsor Junction through Waverley to Dartmouth)
• the Intercolonial Railway Dartmouth Branch Extension (the track from Dartmouth through Eastern Passage, Lawrencetown, Head of Chezzetcook, and Middle Musquodoboit, to Upper Musquodoboit)
• the Great European and North American Short Line Railway (the track from Oxford Junction through Oxford, Pugwash Junction, Tatamagouche, and Scotsburn to Brown's Point, including the spur from Pugwash Junction to Pugwash)
• the Halifax and South Western Railway (the main line track from Halifax through French Village Station, Hubbards, Chester, Mahone Bay, Bridgewater, Liverpool, Shelburne, Barrington and Argyle to Yarmouth, including the spur from Mahone Bay to Lunenburg)
• the Nova Scotia Central Railway (the track from Bridgewater through New Germany, Springfield, and Nictaux to Middleton and from Middleton through Clarence to Bridgetown, including the branch line track from New Germany through Pleasant River and Brookfield Mines to Caledonia, and the spur track from Nictaux to Torbrook Mines)
• the Middleton & Victoria Beach Railway from Middleton through Granville Centre, Granville Ferry, and Karsdale to Port Wade)
• the Liverpool & Milton Railway along the west side of the Mersey River, between Liverpool and Rapid Falls, near Milton, in Queens County

1919 May 27

The First Airplane Trip Across the Atlantic

NOTE: Contrary to what many people believe, Charles Lindbergh was not the first person to fly across the Atlantic.  He was not even the first to fly non-stop across the Atlantic – more than sixty people flew non-stop across the Atlantic before Lindberg.  He was just the first to make the flight alone.

The first airplane trip across the ocean began on 8 May 1919.  In 1917, the United States Navy had purchased four "flying boats" from Glenn Curtiss, the great airplane designer.  These planes, which landed on and took off from water, were given the designation NC, for "Navy-Curtiss."  The three that participated in the first transatlantic plane trip were NC-1, NC-3, and NC-4.  The first leg took the planes from New York to Nova Scotia; the second leg was to Newfoundland; the third leg was planned to end at the Azore Islands, across 1,200 miles of ocean; the fourth leg was supposed to end at another island in the Azores; followed by an 800-mile trip to Portugal.

On Thursday morning, 8 May, NC-1 NC-3, and NC-4 took off from Rockaway Naval Air Station on Long Island, New York, for Halifax, Nova Scotia, on the first leg of the transatlantic journey. The flight was under the command of John Towers, who was also commanding officer and navigator of NC-3. NC-4 was commanded by Lieutenant Commander Albert C. Read, and NC-1 by Lieutenant Commander Patrick N. L. Bellinger.

— Source: The First Airplane Trip Across the Atlantic
Today (May 27th) in Technology History
     www.tecsoc.org/pubs/history/2003/may27.htm

1919 June 6

Canadian National Railways Incorporated

CGR locomotive #5304 type 4-6-2 class J-7-c

1919 September 24

Airmail Begins in the Maritime Provinces

1919 November

Kentville Soon To Have
All-Day Electric Service

Index with links to the other chapters

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