Did you know that Monday, Feb. 23, 2009 marks the centennial of the first powered flight in Canada? Bras d’or Lake, Nova Scotia was the place. J.A. McCurdy was the man. The Silver Dart was the plane.

A brief review of last week’s once upon a time story: once upon a time there were three teens who shared a passion for aviation. I identified PJR as being Paul J. Regan, the one who became a pilot, but with whom LJM and NJW have lost contact. By now, you’ve probably figured who NJW is.

That leaves me to tell you about LJM, Larry J. Milberry, the other one who chose to make aviation his lifelong career. Larry’s CANAV Books is universally recognized as Canada’s best, most prolific and most respected aviation book publisher. Larry is the researcher, the writer, the publisher and the distributor of stories about the history and current activities of aviation in Canada.

When Larry is not at home, he is to be found at airports ranging from Iqaluit to Comox, attending air shows, fly-ins, first-flights, retirement ceremonies and crew reunions. That’s where he interviews, photographs and does air-to-air portraits of contemporary and restored aircraft. He probably spends more hours interviewing people and searching through archives than at his modest east end Toronto home. The process of getting his books to print can take up to 18 months, not counting his more than 50 previous years of immersion in aviation matters. If he were paid by the hour for his efforts, Larry would be earning less than minimum wage. His largest book was the 1,030-page 1997 two-volume Air Transport in Canada.

Larry has acquired the services of Canada’s most respected aviation artists, aviation photographers, its most thorough aviation proofreaders and a very dependable Canadian printing house. Among the artists he has commissioned are Ron E. Lowry, Robert Finlayson and Peter Mossman. Among the many prolific photographers are Hal G. Martin, Jack McNulty, W. T. Larkins, many nameless DND shooters, NJW—and LJM himself. Among those who ferreted out dangling participles and missing commas are Ralph Clint, Ron Pickler and Lambert Huneault. Printing of his recent publications was done by Friesen Printers Ltd., Altona, Manitoba.

Overseeing it all is Larry Milberry, always. His attention to detail, accuracy and readability are among his hallmarks. Few errors or omissions are to be found in his works, the latest of which is Aviation in Canada – The Pioneer Decades, a 176-page gem that chronicles from an 1840 balloon ascent in New Brunswick, the Feb. 23, 1909 first powered flight in Canada by J. A. McCurdy, the WW I era, the disposal of war assets, and finally, a 1981 reunion of surviving veterans of The Great War.

If you have read any of Larry’s 29 previous books, you need not be told anything more than, Aviation in Canada – The Pioneer Decades meets or exceeds all the qualities of its CANAV Books predecessors.