Render lands in Canadian Aviation Hall of Fame

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This article was published 18/06/2022 (1208 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

While Shirley Render has flown airplanes for five decades, it’s not her piloting skills that have earned her a spot in the Canadian Aviation Hall of Fame.

The former MLA and provincial cabinet minister will be inducted into the hall of fame in Calgary June 23 for her work as volunteer, board member and executive director of the Royal Aviation Museum of Western Canada — she has since become its executive director emeritus — as well as for her research into the history of Canadian aviation and her writing that was a result of her investigations.

”That was out of the blue, no pun intended,” Render says after finding out she would be only the 11th woman to be inducted to the aviation hall of fame, which includes First World War ace Billy Bishop, astronaut Chris Hadfield and Andrew Mynarski, the Winnipeg airman and Victoria Cross recipient who died after his bomber crashed in France in June 1944.

A second Manitoban, Clifford MacKay McEwen, who was a pilot in the First World War and would command the RCAF’s No. 6 Group during the final two years of the Second World War, will also enter the hall of fame.

Render was named to the hall in 2020, but the ceremonies were delayed, owing to the COVID-19 pandemic.

“I’m not being honoured for my flying, I’m being honoured more for my wanting to ensure we’ve got Canada’s aviation history well documented,” Render says. “Also, to make sure other people realize it’s an important part of our heritage.”

Render’s research into the history of women aviators in Canada and of the role James A. Richardson, the Winnipeg businessman and aviation pioneer, led to two books she’s written, 1992’s No Place for a Lady: The Story of Canadian Women Pilots 1928-1992 and Double Cross: The Inside Story of James A. Richardson and Canadian Airways.

Her interest in aviation and its history in Canada wouldn’t have started without urging from museum officials for her to learn more about airplanes so she could lead tours.

They encouraged her to take pilot lessons so she could provide accurate information to museum visitors, and in 1973, she earned her licence, which changed her view about aviation.

“Everything sort of took off when I began to fly. It never occurred to me that I would write a book. That was never a childhood dream,” Render says.

She downplays her role in the Royal Aviation Museum of Western Canada’s new home on Wellington Avenue — “All I did was raise the first $28 million,” she says — but her persuasiveness with federal officials played a part in securing the museum’s royal designation.

Render, 79, still wishes she could sit in the pilot’s seat again, whether it’s her plane, a 1948 Luscombe 8F or the time in 1991 when she flew in a CF-18 Hornet fighter jet.

She taught one of her sons — now a captain with Air Canada —his earliest pilot lessons.

”It was a fun plane to fly,” Render says. “It was a regret to have sold it.”

Alan.Small@winnipegfreepress.com

Twitter: @AlanDSmall