30 AIRMEN MARRY CANADIANS

Dominion, Volume 35, Issue 47, 19 November 1941, Page 6

30 AIRMEN MARRY CANADIANS

New Zealanders In

Canada

TRAINEES BUILD FINE REPUTATION

Thirty New Zealand airmen who had gone to Canada under the Empire air training scheme have married Canadian girls. This information was given tlie Wellington Travel Club yesterday by tlie secretary to the New Zealand Air Board, Mr. T. A. Barrow, when he spoke on his tour of training scheme centres in Canada. He added that if some of the girls he saw were a fair average he could say they were very charming indeed. “The conduct, of our lads in Canada lias been outstandingly good. Not one had given any cause for complaint up to the time I left there a fortnight ago. We take a great pride in them, as they carry tlie reputation of this country in their hands, and they are exceptional ambassadors for New Zealand,” said Mr. Barrow. Wartime Town.

Somewhere on the eastern seaboard a ‘.‘Down Under” Club, in which Professor Bennett, formerly of Auckland, took a keen interest, was functioning in what was almost entirely a wartime town. Its peace-time population was not more than 15,000, but it had an itinerant population of 25,000 men engaged in war service training. He had seen 750 New Zealanders there and had been informed that if every one of them took ill they could be placed without cost in private homes within a radius of 25 miles of the town.

Groups of girls organized dances and fishing parties. Eight, out of 10 people there had never heard of New Zealand or Australia before the advent of the Empire training scheme, but the influence of the lads had been such that these conditions no longer existed. A mistake had been made in having “R.N.&A.F.” on the shoulders of the New Zealand airmen, as it had become confused with the R.N.N.A.F. of the Norwegian airmen, but now the tab ‘‘New Zealand” was being used. Mr. Barrow said there was a very large number of New Zealand airmen in training in Canada. They were happy and contented, though at first they found strange the Canadian''and American type of food, which had consisted of more cereals and fruit juices than they were accustomed to, and less meat. All the lads paid a wonderful tribute to their instructors and to the hospitality of the Canadian people. An organization known, as the Imperial Order of Daughters of the Empire did a lot to entertain the boys from New Zealand, and they had a big job because.up to 100,000 men from all. parts of the Empire were being trained in Canada for air-crews. At one re-mus-tering centre, where the service of 12 expert psychologists were retained, a Maori boy from Dannevirke was the head of the school, and very highly regarded. 300 Hours of Air Travel. Mr. Barrow said that in his tour he had travelled 45,000 miles by air and spent 300 hours—twice the amount of flying required fully to train a pilotin the air. He paid a tribute to the outstanding efficiency with which the American air services .were operated, saying it was largely due to them that air travel had become the safest in the world for passengers. It was much safer than the road, slightly safer than the railway, and much better than sea travel just -now. “I was most impressed toy the spirit of the people of the United States. Their attitude toward the war is one of enthusiasm,” said Mr. Barrow. America could help the British Empire much more by continuing 'to send large supplies of armaments and food than by declaring w’ar.. Every American he had met, with one exception, was entirely in sympathy with the people of the British Empire.