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Flashbacks
Reminiscing
Flashbacks
From Our Downhome Readers
The Strength of Love
Stephanie Morgan, Kingston, ON
These are the submitter’s parents, Isaac and Mary Morgan. Married in Toronto, ON, in 1952, they moved back to Conception Bay South, NL, and went on to raise 10 children.
Dorothy Berardis, Chatsworth, CA, USA
This lovely photo of a couple posing with their bridal party is a bit of a mystery. Does anyone recognize any of these well-dressed revellers?
Blossoming Betrothed
Steve Adam, Rossville, GA, USA
Submitter Steve Adam writes, “This is Mom (Patsy Tulk) and Dad (Fritz Adam, 1st Lt. USAF), standing in my grandmother’s garden. In the distance is St. George’s Bay, and further still was Ernest Harmon AFB, Stephenville, where they both worked and met.”
This Month in History
Sir Frederick G. Banting is best known as the youngest man ever to receive the Nobel Prize in medicine for the 1923 co-discovery of insulin, the miraculous therapy for diabetes. The rest of his story is perhaps even more interesting.
In the mid-1930s, Canada initiated a powerful research program designed to protect the pilots and aircrew who were about to go to war in the skies over Europe. Banting and his staff of brilliant scientists conducted top-secret research in aviation medicine and worked on the development of anti-gravity suits and ejection seats.
In 1941, with the future of Britain very much in doubt, Banting was ordered on a mission to coordinate Allied military research. He set out secretly from Gander, NL, in the middle of February on a state-of-the-art Hudson Bomber, in what historian Michael Bliss describes as a “harumscarum ferrying operation that was extremely dangerous.”
The plane crashed shortly after takeoff in a remote area some 16 kilometres from Musgrave Harbour. Mortally wounded, Banting perished on February 21, 1941, before help could arrive.
