By: Rénald Fortier
Ingenium – Canada's Museums of Science and Innovation
“Looks Like An Animated Pipewrench,” but it flew 70 years, 2 months and 6 days ago; Or, How a Blériot Type XI made in Alberta performed an illegal 1 hour and 40 minute return flight from Calais to Dover in July 1955, part 3
The Albertan Blériot Type XI after its cross-Channel flight, France, July 1955. Frank H. Ellis, “Fabriquée par des étudiants de Calgary… Une réplique de l’avion de Blériot a franchi la Manche illégalement.” Technique pour tous, November 1958, 14.
Welcome, welcome, my reading friend. Let us conclude without any further ado the saga of the Alberta-made Blériot Type XI which performed an illegal 1 hour and 40 minute return flight from Calais, France, to Dover, England, in July 1955.
Three days after the successful flight between France and England made on 28 July 1955 by the Frenchman Jean-Baptiste Salis, Jean Henri Brion Chopin de La Bruyère, co-owner of that aircraft, was ready to make his own crossing. And yes, he had re-assembled the Type XI himself, possibly with the help of a French mechanic.
De La Bruyère had certainly not gone unnoticed. Nay. A special correspondent of the renowned French bimonthly Aviation Magazine, Lucien Espinasse, spoke (typed?), in translation, of a “very young great lord” with “magnificent blue eyes illuminating a racy face strongly reminiscent of Louis Breguet,” his grandfather and a French aviation pioneer, you will remember.
De La Bruyère also drove a British luxury sports car, a Jaguar XK120 or XK140 to be more precise, still registered in the United Kingdom, that he admitted having pushed to 210 kilometres/hour (130 miles/hour), possibly in the country roads near Calais. Yee-haw! And yes, he still walked with a cane at that time.
Salis might, I repeat might, have sent his own trailer to Antwerpen / Anvers, Belgium, to pick up the Type XI of his rival and bring it to Calais, a very sporty move if yours truly may state so, but I digress.
Representatives of the Secrétariat général à l’aviation civile et commerciale of the French Ministère des Travaux publics et des Transports quickly burst de La Bruyère’s bubble, however. They would prevent him from taking off until he got an authorisation from their superiors in Paris, France. Said superiors might well have known that the registration of de La Bruyère’s Type XI had been cancelled by Canada’s Department of Transport.
Mind you, it has been suggested that the French authorities grounded the Type XI because of an exceptionally heavy air traffic, more than 100 flights per day, at the Aéroport de Calais, near Marck, France.
Even so, de La Bruyère did, however, manage to make a couple of brief test flights.
It has been suggested that de La Bruyère also grabbed a pot of red paint and blotted out the now useless Canadian registration of the Type XI. Puzzled by that action, a person in authority at the airport allegedly asked him why he had done so. De La Bruyère allegedly quipped, in translation: “No identification number, no nationality – no permit needed to fly.” That suggestion proved utterly groundless, however. The registration was not blotted out.
De La Bruyère surreptitiously took off toward Dover on 31 July, with a single escort aircraft in tow, the pilot of a second aircraft having decided to stay put because the weather was a tad too bad for his taste – and he was not the one piloting the flying clothes iron. In other words, the Type XI.
The cap of the Type XI’s oil tank soon got loose, however. His face and goggles covered in oil, de La Bruyère could not see a thing. Dodging patches of fog, the young pilot had no choice but to return to the Aéroport de Calais. A roll of adhesive tape was soon put to use. I kid you not.
As a few men pushed the Type XI toward the runway, they did not see a runway marker. The elevator of the aircraft hit it, and was damaged. The roll of adhesive might have been put to use a second time.
De La Bruyère, it seemed, just could not catch a break.
The young pilot managed to take off a second time, which raised an interesting question: what was the staff of the airport doing as all of that jiggery-pokery took place. Yours truly has a feeling that our young friend made sure to take off before office hours, but still and I still digress.
De la Bruyère had hoped to lift off from Sangatte-Blériot-Plage, the site from which Louis Charles Joseph Blériot had lifted off in July 1909 but the Secrétariat général à l’aviation civile et commerciale had presumably vetoed the idea.
Several kilometres (several miles) from Dover, the engine of the Type XI began to miss and vibrate quite violently. De La Bruyère made it to Dover but did not land. He might have feared that the British Ministry of Transport and Civil Aviation would impound his aircraft. After all, the flight de La Bruyère was attempting to complete was utterly illegal.
In any event, de La Bruyère circled part of Dover once and headed toward Calais. And yes, his engine was still misbehaving. Indeed, smoke was now coming out of it. De La Bruyère had to clean his oil covered goggles at least once. Things got so bad that he began to look for ships, in case he had to make an emergency water landing. Indeed, a frightened de La Bruyère might have made his return trip moving from ship to ship.
The Type XI finally arrived over the Aéroport de Calais. The weather was gusty and far from ideal for a landing. The staff in the tower cleared the skies to facilitate that landing. As the aircraft touched the runway and began to roll, two men rushed toward it. They grabbed a hold of the Type XI and brought it to a stop.
The people present were obviously delighted. Salis was on hand to congratulate de La Bruyère.
De La Bruyère’s return flight had lasted an hour and 40 or so minutes.
Would you like to see some French language footage of that flight and of its preparations, not to mention some footage of the flight made by Salis? Well, here it is…
Well aware that the Type XI would never fly again if it returned to Canada, aware also that he did not have the moolah needed to return the aircraft to Alberta, de La Bruyère graciously donated it to Salis or, more precisely, to the latter’s Centre de La Ferté-Alais, a flying museum located near… La Ferté-Alais, France, south of Paris.
The young pilot did so after quipping that he would have flown the Type XI back to Canada if he “could have arranged for an aircraft carrier to be anchored every [8 kilometres] five miles across the Atlantic.”
Did money change hands, you ask, my reading friend? A good question. Who knows?
Although fairly annoyed by what had taken place, the Secrétariat général à l’aviation civile et commerciale decided not to press charges. It might, however, have briefly impounded the Type XI before returning it to its pilot. In the end, the French authorities let de La Bruyère off with a warning not to pull a stunt like that again. The young pilot was relieved. His wild and crazy days were over, he stated to journalists, adding that he simply wanted to get back to Edmonton, Alberta, and his day job.
Would you believe that a 17-year-old Canadian female swimmer, Marilyn Grace Bell, successfully crossed the Channel on the very day de La Bruyère made his crossing, namely 31 July 1955? I kid you not. She completed that grueling journey in 14 hours and 36 minutes. At the time, Bell was the youngest person to have made the crossing.
A very happy Jean Henri Brion Chopin de La Bruyère a few days after his cross Channel flight, Edmonton Municipal Airport, Edmonton, Alberta. Anon., “Jean de la Bruyère de retour.” La Presse, 11 August 1955, 46.
De La Bruyère spent a weekend in Ottawa, Ontario, in early August. He and his business partner, Alastair Auld « Sandy » Mactaggart, met several journalists who were keen to hear their story.
De La Bruyère arrived in Edmonton slightly before mid-August. He indicated to journalists who were waiting for him that he had crossed the Channel for the sport of it and that he was glad to return to his day job.
De La Bruyère did point out, however, that the aforementioned Secrétariat général à l’aviation civile et commerciale had facilitated the cross-Channel flight made by Salis because it could not accept that a foreigner would perform that act of remembrance.
It is worth noting that Salis did not keep the Albertan Type XI all that long. One of the most important movie studios on planet Earth bought it not too long before the shooting of an American war film known at the time as C’est la Guerre began, on American soil, in October 1956. Warner Brothers Pictures Incorporated then turned over the aircraft to the technical aviation director of the film, so that he could supervise its use.
And yes, that individual would supervise the use of the 10 or so (?) airworthy aircraft involved in the plot, as well as the couple of aircraft used to film the aerial scenes.
In any event, C’est la Guerre was the first movie project of American antique aircraft collector / movie consultant / movie stunt pilot Frank Gifford Tallman III. It would not be his last.
Retitled With You in My Arms at some point in 1957, I think, to better reflect its romantic aspect, the motion picture in question was first shown on the big screen in February 1958. By that time, it was known as Lafayette Escadrille. The title of the French-dubbed version of the film was seemingly C’est la Guerre.
While it was true that its flying sequences were well received, Lafayette Escadrille did not prove popular with critics, or audiences, because of its mediocre story and flat acting – a problem which has plagued many (most?) aviation movies of the 20th century.
Worse still, the surviving members of the First World War American fighter unit known as the Lafayette Escadrille as well as the film’s director, William Augustus Wellman, a veteran who had served in another Aéronautique militaire squadron, were so upset by what was shown on screen that they disowned the movie.
And yes, the Lafayette Escadrille was officially known under the designation of N124 squadron of the Aéronautique militaire of the French Armée de Terre.
If he had not in fact bought it in 1956, Tallman seemingly acquired the Type XI at some point in 1957.
A brief digression if I may. Would you believe that Tallman acquired in 1956 a Farman S. 11 / MF.11 biplane dating from 1915-16? That aircraft eventually found its way into the collection of what is now the Canada Aviation and Space Museum, in Ottawa, Ontario. End of digression.
Frank Gifford Tallman III and his Blériot Type XI, Friendship International Airport, near Baltimore, Maryland. Walter Ward, “Wing And A Prayer – 47-Year-Old [sic] Bleriot Monoplane Is Flown Over Friendship Field.” The Evening Sun, 25 July 1957, 56.
On 25 July 1957, Tallman “reenacted” the cross-Channel flight made by Blériot on 25 July 1909 by covering the 40 or so kilometres (25 or so miles) separating Friendship International Airport, near Baltimore, Maryland, and Andrews Air Force Base, near Morningside, Maryland.
That flight made entirely over land was made under the auspices of the Air Force Association, an association which served / serves as a veterans’ association and advocacy group for air power, as part a week-long commemoration of the 50th anniversary of the United States Air Force.
And yes, I do realise that this service had been created in September 1947, not in 1907. What had taken place in early August 1907 was the creation of the Aeronautical Division of the United States Army Signal Corps, the first military air service on planet Earth.
Tallman did not really enjoy the flight made on 25 July 1957. You see, his helmet and goggles were ripped off his head at about the halfway point. Tallman could hardly see a thing from then on. He was arguably quite lucky to complete his journey and land in one piece.
Other flights also proved problematic, in other ways.
In early March 1957 for example, Tallman had left Van Nuys Airport, in Los Angeles, California, aboard the Type XI in order to reach Palmdale Airport, in… Palmdale, California, 50 or so kilometres (30 or so miles) away. He undertook that journey to take part in an air show which was to become one of the elements of an episode of Wide Wide Word, a popular documentary television series broadcasted by a struggling American radio and television network, National Broadcasting Company.
As Tallman approached the San Gabriel Mountains, he soon realised that the Type XI would not be able to clear them. He therefore turned back and alighted at Van Nuys Airport. The Type XI was then partly dismantled and put on a truck which safely made the journey to Palmdale Airport.
Oddly enough, Tallman contacted the Canadian Department of Transport in June 1959 to see if the Type XI had been registered in Canada. He needed that information because the American Civil Aeronautics Authority wanted to have said information in order to decide whether or not the Type XI could be registered in the United States. Tallman was duly informed that the Type XI had indeed been registered in Canada at some point. As a result of this, Tallman was able to register the Type XI in September 1959.
What was / is odd about the registration date of September 1959 was that the Type XI had flown in the United States as early as 1957, as can be seen in the photograph above. Indeed, it seemingly flew during the filming of Lafayette Escadrille, in late 1956. How could that be, you ask, my perplexed reading friend? I wish I knew.
This being said (typed?), you will undoubtedly have noted that at least one photograph of the Type XI dating from July 1957 does not show the registration visible in those dating from the early 1960s. Dare one consider the possibility that the aircraft flew in the United States before September 1959 without a proper registration?
Yours truly wonders if Tallman’s inquiry was related to a project of his to fly to Long Beach Airport, in… Long Beach, California, after having taken off from Catalina Airport, near Avalon, California, a town located on Santa Catalina Island, a small island off the coast of the state. For some reason or other, an insufficient number of sponsors perhaps, that 50 or so kilometre (30 or so miles) flight did not take place.
Tallman had seemingly wanted to make the same crossing in 1957 as part of a television show only to have that project foiled by executives of a television network who wanted no part in what they thought was suicide. Was the show in question Wide Wide Word, you ask, my reading friend? I wish I knew.
In October 1961, however, Tallman successfully flew between Santa Catalina Island and Long Beach during the International Air Show held at Chino Airport, near Chino, California. And here is proof…
Frank Gifford Tallman III and his Blériot Type XI during the flight between Catalina Airport, near Avalon, California, and Long Beach Airport, in Long Beach, California. Anon., “Relic Revives Past – 1910 [sic] Plane Flies From Catalina in 58 Mins.” Los Angeles Times, 16 October 1961, part 3, 2.
An airplane and a helicopter accompanied Tallman during his flight, to take pictures and help if need be. As luck would have it, California was experiencing a heat wave at the time. The temperature in Long Beach was a scalding 43° Celsius (110 °Fahrenheit). Yikes!
Incidentally, the sailing ship in the photograph you just saw was an enlarged replica of HMAV Bounty, the Royal Navy ship involved in a famous April 1789 mutiny, in the Pacific Ocean.
Did you know that said replica had been constructed by Smith & Rhuland Limited, a well known if not famous shipyard located in Lunenburg, Nova Scotia?
It had been ordered by one of the major film studios on planet Earth, an American studio of course, Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Incorporated, for a motion picture whose premiere took place in November 1962. Although visually gorgeous, Mutiny on the Bounty was a box office flop.
If I may be permitted to digress for a moment, the commanding officer of HMAV Bounty at the time of the mutiny, William Bligh, was apparently not the unsavoury character portrayed by 3 movie actors over the years. Nay. He was a perfectionist, yes, but also a superb navigator.
Incidentally, again, Bligh was apparently a commanding lieutenant in 1789, not a captain, and you have a question, my reading friend? What does HMAV mean, you say? That acronym stood / stands for His Majesty’s Armed Vessel, say I, ye barnacle.
Actually, have you noticed that the actors who portrayed Bligh (movie bad guy) and the chief of the mutineers (movie good guy), Fletcher Christian, in the 3 movies released since the 1930s were respectively British and American? It went without saying that those movies were American. Come to think of it, British / English movie actors have often been used to portray characters whose devilry was checked by heroes played by actors born in the United States, but back to our story.
Tallman also flew from Metropolitan Oakland International Airport, near… Oakland, California, to Crissy Field, a United States Army airfield located in San Francisco, California. He did so slightly before mid-September 1962, a week or so before the airport was officially inaugurated.
Albert Paul Mantz, on the left, and Frank Gifford Tallman III taking the pose with the Blériot Type XI which would soon go on display in their international air and space museum, Movieland of the Air, Orange County Airport, near Santa Ana, California. Anon., “–.” The Tustin News, 5 December 1963, 6.
The Type XI went on display at Movieland of the Air, an air and space museum opened in mid-December 1963 at Orange County Airport, near Santa Ana, California, by Tallman and his business partner, American movie consultant / movie stunt pilot Albert Paul Mantz. Incidentally, it looks as if the aforementioned S. 11 / MF.11 biplane was also on display in Movieland of the Air.
Yours truly presumes that this museal institution was somehow connected with Tallmantz Aviation Incorporated, a film industry service firm formed in 1961 by Tallman and Mantz.
During the weeks and months which followed the opening of Movieland of the Air, the Type XI was described as a Type XI made in France around 1910, which was utter nonsense.
The recently remarried widow of David Franz McTavish, Marjorie Mae Stauffer, born Elias, McTavish being one of the co-sponsors of the aircraft back in 1952-53, pointed that out when she visited Movieland of the Air on her honeymoon, seemingly in the mid-1960s. After seeing the initials of her new husband, Gerald Victor “Gerry” Stauffer, stamped onto the fuel tank of the Type XI, Tallman graciously agreed to change the text panel.
Was the change actually done, you ask, my slightly cynical reading friend? While yours truly has no reason to doubt Tallman’s good faith, things do not always happen as planned in the world of museums. (Hello, EP, EG and SB!)
You may wish to note that what follows was very sad indeed.
Mantz died in early July 1965, in the crash of a one-off aircraft designed and built for a financially disappointing 1965 American survival film, The Flight of the Phoenix. Tallman was supposed to fly that aircraft but had to step aside when he broke a leg in a go-cart accident, in early June. Infection having set in, the leg had to be amputated above the knee, in late July.
As you may well imagine, those events greatly affected the activities of Movieland of the Air and Tallmantz Aviation. Indeed, Tallman had to raise substantial amounts of money to settle the Mantz estate, fight off related lawsuits and keep Tallmantz Aviation afloat.
Even so, in February 1966, Tallman had to sell the core of Movieland of the Air, that is 45 or so aircraft as well as numerous aircraft engines and weapons, not to mention displays and dioramas, to a group of American investors who owned a large truck and automobile dealership as well as a grain selling firm, Rosen-Novak Auto Company of Omaha, Nebraska, and Morrison-Quirk Grain Company of Hastings, Nebraska.
The new owners agreed to keep the aircraft, dioramas and displays on the museum floor until they were resold, hopefully as a single unit which could be used to launch another museum.
The catch with that plan was that the asking price for at least some of the aircraft proved to be too high. As a result, only 10 or so aircraft were sold in 1966-67.
In 1968, the new owners had to face the facts. They were not going to find someone willing to buy the aircraft at the hoped for prices. They therefore hired one of the largest fine arts auction houses in the United States, Parke-Bernet Galleries Incorporated of New York City, New York, to dispose of everything.
The Type XI was one of the 40 or so complete, disassembled or incomplete aircraft sold at auction in late May 1968. Its buyer paid US $ 6 750 for the aircraft, a sum which corresponds to approximately $ 80 500 in 2024 Canadian currency. And yes, the aforementioned S. 11 / MF.11 biplane was also sold at the May 1968 auction.
All in all, the many items on offer sold for a fraction of their real value. The acquisition of the core of Movieland of the Air had proven to be a very costly mistake, but I digress.
While yours truly cannot say who acquired the Type XI in 1968, I can state with a great deal of certainty that it was acquired at some point, in 1971 I think, by the flamboyant Irving B. “Irv” Perlitch, one of the founders of the recreational vehicle industry, and / or his equally flamboyant spouse, Janice “Jan” Perlitch, born Levine, a pilot with whom yours truly apparently shares a day of birth. Ours is a small world, is it not?
No, not a year of birth, a day. I am not that old.
Our world is not that small actually. Would you believe that there is a 50-50 chance that any group of 23 people will include 2 individuals with the same day of birth? I kid you not. That counterintuitive conclusion is known as a veridical paradox, by the way. But I digress. Again. Sorry.
The Perlitch couple, also known as Perch, was the proud and well-off owner of, among other things, The Flying Lady, a restaurant located in its family recreational area / amusement park, Hill Country, near Morgan Hill, California.
Why would such a couple buy the Type XI, you ask, my reading friend? A good question. You see, Mr. Perlitch was an aircraft collector.
Indeed, he was such a keen collector that he financed the construction of a new and larger building to house The Flying Lady. Completed in 1981, that huge complex included a dance floor with a bandstand, a gift shop, 4 bars and 2 dining rooms able to welcome up to 1 200 people.
Said complex housed no less than 7 aircraft hanging from the ceiling of one or both of the dining rooms and 100 or so model aircraft planes which continuously circled one or both of those dining rooms on a track mounted below their ceilings. I kid you not.
There was also a downstairs area known as Main Street which included a town hall, a hotel, a saloon and a cheese store. There might also have been a replica of the house where, in 1777, Elizabeth “Betsy” Ross, born Griscom, created the second official flag of the United States, if one was / is to believe a largely discredited story.
And yes, the Type XI was one of the aircraft hanging from a ceiling, at least at some point, until the revamped restaurant opened perhaps.
The Flying Lady 2.0, at one time the world’s largest restaurant if one was to believe The Guinness Book of Records, was located near the Perlitches’ antique automobile and aircraft private if open to the public museal institution, the Wagons to Wings Museum, which contained 100 or so terrestrial and aerial vehicles.
Forced into bankruptcy as a result of the lawsuits launched after the collapse of a wooden deck extension of The Flying Lady, in January 1989, a collapse which injured 15 or so people, the Perlitches sold Hill Country in 1994, to the newly founded American Institute of Mathematics, a nonprofit organisation founded by John Fry, a mathematics enthusiast and co-owner of Fry’s Electronics Incorporated, an American big box store chain, and Stephen “Steve” Sorenson, a computer engineer.
The antique aircraft and automobiles were presumably sold to collectors and / or museums at that time.
It has been suggested that an American certificate of airworthiness was issued, presumably to the owner(s) of the Type XI, in January 2003. That certificate allegedly expired in July 2013.
Yours truly does not know if the Albertan Type XI was still with us as of 2024. Any information on the current whereabouts of that historic aircraft would be most welcome.
Sadly, neither de La Bruyère not Mactaggart were with us as I wrote those lines. The former died in April 1990 at the age of 62. Mactaggart, on the other hand, passed away in July 2012 at the age of 89.
The gentleman behind the creation of the Albertan Type XI, Stanley N. “Stan” Green, died in October 1977, at the age of 72. His partner in that project, David Franz McTavish, had perished in a crash, in February 1963. He was only 46 years old.
This writer wishes to thank the people who provided information. Any mistake contained in this article is my fault, not theirs.
See you later.
Rénald Fortier
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