Canada's
Bushplane Heritage
and Forest
Fire Education Centre
Sault Ste.
Marie, Ontario
June 6th, 2000
In our 
travels across North America, museums have been
a staple for our story telling. Here we find most of the work
done for us in a concise, compact presentation, ready to be
digested and reported on. With literally hundreds of museums
behind us, we have become somewhat connoisseurs on this type of
presentation. There are many different approaches, from the
lively action packed "living" museum to the sterile
glass cased artifacts of the "static" type. So with
less then a week in Canada, it was time to check out the local
museums and see if a different country meant a different type of
museum. Having done articles on such celebrated air museums as
Pensacola Air Station museum,
the SAC museum in Nebraska, and the Glen Curtis
museum in New York, I felt I had a good handle on what to gauge
an air museum by. With this in mind, we stopped off at the
Canadian Bushplane Heritage and Forest Fire Education Centre in
Sault Ste. Marie, Ontario. The building itself was not
impressive. It looked like a big hanger, which of course it was.
Having explained our intention to the sales clerk, I was about to
experience my first pleasant surprise. 
The general manager, Don Johnson came striding
off the hanger main floor, with his broad smile and warm hand
shake. We exchanged courtesies and I explained my desires.
"Sure, come on", he beamed and started us on our way to
a new understanding of the famous expression
"bushplane". Right from the start we could tell that
this man was more then a business manager, his tone, at times
almost reverent toward the museum and the planes it held, told us
that he was far closer to his work then mere professionalism
would create. As he walked us toward 
the small theater he explained that the Centre,
he avoided using the word museum, was the result of several old
timers who had for the most part worked for an organization
called the Ontario Provincial Air Service. This service created
on April 1, 1924 is the longest continuously running non-
commercial air service in World. It is still functional as the
Aviation and Fire Management Branch of the Ontario Ministry of
Natural Resources. As we approached the theater, we were joined
by the President of the Centre, Rick Harrison. With sleeves
rolled up and obviously just coming from some effort yet
explained, 
his enthusiasm for the Centre added to the
interest of what we were about to see. We settled down into our
seats which Rick explained with obvious satisfaction, had come
from an old DC-9 aircraft. Through this 12 minute film we learned
that the Centre honors the work of bushpilots and the Ontario
Provincial Air Service. Bushpilots helped to open up the Canadian
North, while the OPAS played a major role in protecting 
Ontario's
forest. The hanger that presently houses the Center was built in
1948 on the original site of the very first building the OPAS
used as a hanger in 1924. The run-up ramp leading from the St.
Mary's river is still used by float planes when visiting the
Centre. This hanger is the very place that the original concept
of waterbombing a fire was invented and developed. After the
movie, both Rick and Don took us out onto the main hanger floor
where the pride they felt for the machines they displayed was as
evident as the smiles on their faces. I wandered off with Rick
while Don took Laura in a different direction.
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