Education Programs
The Welland Silver Dart Educational Program
© Jack Minor
The educational program had its roots back in 1999 when I and a group of ultra light pilots at a local airdrome just west of Port Colborne, Ontario were discussing just how to celebrate the 2003 Centennial of the Wright Brothers first powered and controlled flight of a heavier-than-air flying machine.
Ken Merritt and I were already planning to attend the ceremonies in Kitty Hawk, NC in the United States for the 1903 Centennial festivities, but I was thinking ahead to what I could do to help to educate the public about the early days of aviation pioneering.
One Sunday morning after a the usual morning of flying, I asked the manager of the local Harvey-Swiss Chalet, Tanya Shultz, if she would sponsor me if I put together a set of displays and take them around to the local schools and lecture the teachers and students about the early aviation pioneers, culminating in the early flights of the Wright Brothers, and she agreed to do it
The same morning I asked my good friend Sandy McCallion if he would be interested in helping me, and Sandy agreed to help out. In fact we became partners in this endeavour.
We started to do these lectures in early 2003 and when we did the last one at the end of May 2004, we had done a total of 137 one-hour lectures in primary schools alone.
By this time we were also giving public lectures to service clubs, historical societies, air shows and fairs.
In 2004 I decided to extend my lectures to cover the coming Centennial ot the Silver Dart, which was the first powered and controlled man-carrying aircraft to fly in Canada and the then British Empire.
In the late1990s, I had started to collect plans and blueprints of the Silver Dart with the idea of building a full-size flying replica to coincide with the 2003 American centennial of flight and the Canadian centennial of flight which would take place in 2009. The building of this replica was started in July, 2004
At first I did these lectures alone but then another pilot friend, Mark Taylor came on board and we became partners not only in lecturing, but we also built a smaller version of the Silver Dart for the Ultralight Pilots Association of Canada (UPAC), which we also take around to the schools.
The students take turns sitting in this half-scale Silver Dart and operate the controls. These lectures were sponsored by Harvey Swiss Chalet and UPAC.
When Mark Taylor had to step down from these lectures because of medical problems, John Srnythe and Charlie Boudreau came on board for a year, but they too had to step down because of other commitments. Then Norm Sonennberg and Bill McCraw started to help out in 2009, our Centennial year of flight in Canada and in the Commonwealth of Nations.
In 2007 the Welland Silver Dart building group asked me if I would include the story of the building of their Silver Dart replica, as the Trillium Foundation of Ontario stipulated that a portion of their grant was to be spent on education and I agreed to do this.
The Province Of Ontarios Trillium Foundation became the third major sponsor of our Silver Dart Centennial Educational Group.
To date I estimate that we have personally given in excess of 250 one-hour lectures, as well as participating in air shows, fairs and festivals, along with appearances at malls and dinner meetings to touch over 250,000 men, women and students with our story of the pioneers of early aviation Canadian and American.
Our educational group has travelled from Port Colborne ON, north to Lake Simcoe and Aylmer, Qu退bec, west to Woodstock, ON, east to Montr退al (2 times) and most recently, was scheduled to head south early in October, 2009, to Dayton, Ohio, at the request of the Wright Brothers Family Heritage Foundation.
I express my gratitude for some funding from the Ontario Trillium Foundation, which has made it possible to defray many of our expenses.
Call me at 905 - 835-2752 for lecture bookings.