Western Standard - May 29, 2026


A mission to preserve Canada's Cold War air force history


Episode Stats


Length

13 minutes

Words per minute

171.94615

Word count

2,316

Sentence count

56


Summary

Summaries generated with gmurro/bart-large-finetuned-filtered-spotify-podcast-summ .

Transcript

Transcript generated with Whisper (turbo).
00:00:00.000 Good evening, Western Standard viewers, and welcome to a special edition of The Hannover Show,
00:00:21.120 a weekly politics show on the Western Standard. Today is May the 28th, and our guests are major
00:00:26.940 retired Bob Wade, a former snowbird and Cold War fighter pilot. He is also currently the director
00:00:33.400 of exhibits and displays for the museum. Also joining us today is Ed McGilvery, retired
00:00:39.180 brigadier general and vice chair of the Air Force Museum Society of Alberta. Okay, so thank you
00:00:45.620 again for joining us today, guys. So I hear you are currently doing a fundraiser for the Air Force
00:00:53.560 museum but before we get into that i kind of want to hear your guys's like history because you both
00:00:59.960 were pilots during the cold war so why don't we start with you bob yeah tell us a little summary
00:01:05.240 of like what it was like during that time charlie i joined the air force in 1968 because i'd seen
00:01:12.600 the golden hawks fly over top of our farm west of edmonton and i wanted to be a fighter pilot
00:01:18.200 and so that i went through pilot training they made me an instructor because there's no fighter
00:01:22.680 jobs available I instructed for three years and then they started the snowbird aerobatic team
00:01:27.960 so I flew with the team two years and then I finally got my snow or my starfighter posting
00:01:33.240 sent to Germany for five years and then I instructed for a couple of years in Coal Lake
00:01:38.220 on the starfighter when we bought the F-18 they just moved me over to be an instructor on the F-18
00:01:43.620 so I did that for four years and then I was posted to 441 squadron which was in charge of air defense
00:01:50.600 for Western Canada from the West Coast to Winnipeg to the North Pole.
00:01:54.900 And so that we ran alert operations, flew out of Benuvik,
00:01:58.600 intercepting Russian bombers coming across the North Pole.
00:02:01.400 Then I retired to the airlines in 91.
00:02:04.740 Okay, well, what about you, Ed?
00:02:06.600 Very similar.
00:02:08.580 I graduated a little earlier than Bob in the 60s.
00:02:11.860 And actually, Bob was one of my students when I instructed on the T-33
00:02:15.020 after I got my wings.
00:02:16.860 And then I also went on 104, so a little earlier than Bob, and served in Germany for five years,
00:02:23.980 from 72 to 77. Came back and instructed on the CF-104 in Coal Lake as well. Then went to various
00:02:30.380 staff jobs. Then I came back as a squadron commander on the CF-18 and was posted to
00:02:35.340 Germany. Whereas Bob stayed in Canada instructing on the CF-18, I went back to Germany for another
00:02:41.020 four years and then came back uh pushed back to coal lake as a base grounder there so uh i guess
00:02:49.020 it's safe to say that part of my responsibilities was in norad at that time both bob and i had
00:02:54.220 originally started in the nato business and then we ended up in the norad business so that's uh
00:02:59.900 that's a a thumbnail sketch of my career in the military okay well um why don't we talk a little
00:03:05.900 bit about the history of the air force museum and your guys's involvement in it as well okay
00:03:10.780 Okay. Well, just a brief history. It used to be the museum at Crow Trial Trailed used
00:03:17.500 to be an army museum of the regiment, strictly army. And around the year 1999, Air Force
00:03:23.380 veterans and Navy veterans were approached to see if they would join to make it a military
00:03:28.100 museum with all three services, Army, Navy, and Air Force. The Navy was lucky. They had
00:03:32.880 a museum already at their reserve facility in Calgary. The Air Force had nothing. So
00:03:39.500 We fundraised and we built in addition to the main museum there and started a small
00:03:45.940 virtual, mainly virtual history, Air Force Museum in the main building.
00:03:51.260 And then in early, I guess it would be early 2010 or so Bobby, we started raising the funds
00:03:58.600 for the Cold War exhibit.
00:04:00.820 And as it turns out, we had the airplanes.
00:04:03.540 We have an F-86 Sabre 104 and F-18 in the Cold War exhibit, and it's covered.
00:04:11.640 It's a complete facility for the Cold War exhibit for the NATO aircraft, okay?
00:04:16.220 And then we decided we had to build a Cold War exhibit,
00:04:21.540 covered Cold War exhibit for the NORAD aircraft.
00:04:23.660 So we procured three aircraft, a T-33 trainer, a CF-100, a CF-101.
00:04:29.140 It all served North American air defense.
00:04:31.700 and we built um we built the foundation the concrete foundation for those three aircraft
00:04:38.480 and that cost a little over two million dollars for that and now we we're short of funds to
00:04:45.380 purchase we don't have enough money to build an overall facility of sprung shelter to cover these
00:04:50.940 aircraft and that's what that's what we're uh really funded fundraising right now about we've
00:04:56.020 How much have we spent, Bobby, right now?
00:05:00.280 Yeah, we spent $2.1 million putting in that foundation floor.
00:05:04.020 It's got underfloor heating, so I can move airplanes around on top of the cement,
00:05:09.260 which is really important.
00:05:11.520 And we'll probably need about $4.1 million to complete the structure.
00:05:18.280 We have $1.1 million in the bank,
00:05:23.100 But we need another $4.1 million to finalize the overall sprung shelter of the of the final Cold War exhibit for the NORAD.
00:05:30.400 I should point out, this is very important, I think, Leah, is that it's a it's a quite an interesting tourist attraction in Calgary.
00:05:40.540 And I like to quote from from TripAdvisor, the Air Force Museum Society of Alberta ranks as the second overall attraction out of over 400 things to do in Calgary.
00:05:51.580 based on consistently high travel ratings on TripAdvisor.
00:05:55.740 So, you know, if we can finish this exhibit,
00:06:00.000 we hope to move up to number one, if you will.
00:06:02.360 And right now, we've got dozens and dozens of volunteers
00:06:05.000 that access docents and fundraising and maintaining
00:06:10.200 and running the Air Force Museum.
00:06:12.780 So we're very fortunate that we've got, like I say,
00:06:15.140 dozens of veterans and people that are interested in aviation
00:06:18.280 that are helping us out with this endeavor
00:06:20.480 and keeping the museum running day to day that's good yeah it's important to us uh because that
00:06:27.360 cold war never got much attention really to the canadian public kids aren't taught about the cold
00:06:33.680 war in school and we wanted to tell that story because there were 937 air force people lost
00:06:40.240 during that cold war and none of that was combat those were just day-to-day operations
00:06:45.920 and eddie and i both did you know i lost 38 boys i flew with every day in 23 years you know so it's
00:06:51.360 important to us to tell that story we both did yeah exactly you know and uh it's important for
00:06:58.240 canadians to understand that you know peace is not the absence of war but the maintenance of
00:07:04.480 those hard-won freedoms that we uh we served to accomplish back in that cold war right that's why
00:07:11.520 we want to tell that story i think it's worthwhile pointing out that last year we had over 50 000
00:07:16.320 visitors to our museum and dozens and dozens and hundreds of school children and we believe that
00:07:22.880 is very important because the motto of our museum is preserve remember and educate so if we can talk
00:07:28.720 to the school children about uh what the core was all about the sacrifices that canadians made
00:07:34.400 uh to preserve the pieces bob said then that's important to us but we've got literally thousands
00:07:41.120 of school children visit our museum every year that's pretty good well um also i'd like to know
00:07:47.440 once you do raise these funds how long do you think it'll take to finalize the building's
00:07:53.040 completion let's take about five months yeah yeah yeah and uh sprung structures are the is a
00:08:01.360 manufacturer of the buildings themselves and they're uh world renowned you know for how well
00:08:07.360 they do at that and phil sprung the owner of sprung structure is really excited about getting
00:08:14.000 the structure built and getting these airplanes on display they've been a very very solid supporter
00:08:19.680 of our museum for years because they built the first sprung shelter now they're they're waiting
00:08:24.480 for us to find the money so they can build the second sprung shelter so we really want to get
00:08:29.520 those airplanes uh undercover because uh yeah you know if you leave mountain elements with the
00:08:34.400 weather in Calgary with the snow and ice and whatnot, it's not conducive to preservation of
00:08:39.840 those historic aircraft. And those historic aircraft are very important. There's not many
00:08:43.920 of them around, so we want to make sure we look after them. That makes sense. Well, I would also
00:08:48.960 like to know, would you be able to get any snowbirds also into the exhibit once it's built?
00:08:55.840 Yeah. We're currently waiting for the delivery of two snowbird airplanes
00:09:02.080 from back in the earlier days not the ones the teams flying today but back from earlier times
00:09:08.300 that retired 20 years ago and were sent to a school for training down in Borden Ontario so
00:09:15.400 I'm waiting to take delivery of those and we'll put them on pedestals facing each other just like
00:09:20.520 the head-on pass that the snowbirds do during their air shows well that's cool so it's going
00:09:24.940 to be cool yeah yeah oh do you when do you think you're gonna get them like I shouldn't get them
00:09:29.380 this summer now uh i'm sure everybody's heard that the snowboard team's shutting down after
00:09:34.420 this season you know so there'll be more airplanes available uh unfortunately but uh it's a it's a
00:09:42.900 story that's uh had 55 years of history you know i flew on the team in 70 years 73 74 you know 55
00:09:51.060 years ago you know so that's a lot of air shows and uh it's kind of got a canadian reputation
00:09:58.100 yeah now people identify with the strawberry aerobatic team well i also like to know where
00:10:04.340 you guys like storing the airplanes right now without the building being constructed
00:10:11.780 we have this the concrete pad and as bob's already pointed out the concrete pad was uh
00:10:16.580 we needed desperately needed that uh uh and we need to do it right because uh you know to
00:10:22.660 to ensure the integrity of the building.
00:10:26.220 So when we took the airplanes,
00:10:28.360 and it's interesting, we procured the airplanes.
00:10:31.240 The CF-100 is an old air defense fighter
00:10:33.720 that was active in the 50s and 60s.
00:10:36.040 We needed two aircraft to make one, if you will,
00:10:39.000 because both of them were in such rough shape.
00:10:41.380 So now we combined the two into one aircraft.
00:10:44.720 So we've got the T-33 trainer, the CF-100, the CF-101,
00:10:49.040 which were air defense aircraft,
00:10:50.720 they're sitting on the concrete foundation now oh okay so they're so but it's still they're open to
00:10:55.840 the air so there's a little bit more work that has to be done on the aircraft uh so uh the concrete
00:11:02.080 foundation is a is a good place for the work to be done yeah yeah bobby no yeah because i have to
00:11:07.840 uh rebuild the cockpits uh of both those airplanes and also paint them you know and so we want to
00:11:13.280 paint them in colors that they served in during the uh cold war or that era of our history
00:11:20.480 does it also you said like painting and all that stuff but does it cost money to maintain
00:11:24.640 the aircraft oh yes it costs money to maintain the whole operation you know the lights the water uh
00:11:31.280 uh the electricity uh maintain the aircraft itself because we do have to paint them uh you know every
00:11:37.440 couple of years especially the one if you notice of crow child trail there's an f5 on a pedestal
00:11:42.400 there that has to be painted what every three or four years yeah yeah it's 50 000 if you paint
00:11:47.680 better but yeah we're talking about fundraising for a capital project here but we also have funds
00:11:54.000 but we do have funds to maintain operations and maintenance those as well yeah yeah that's good
00:11:59.520 to know well why don't you guys also tell the audience where they can donate i'd love to tell
00:12:05.680 them uh we have a website and you can um you can donate through the website uh when you go to visit
00:12:12.560 at the museum we have a a paypal touch facility but you can also send any donations by mail
00:12:20.480 into the air force museum society and i'll just give you the address if i may
00:12:24.480 and it's four five two zero road trial trail southwest calgary t2t5j4 and you can make
00:12:33.600 attention ed mcgill over your bob wade and we'll get it and we'll get it okay sounds good it'd be
00:12:38.960 very nice if people would would help us out for sure definitely okay and once you do raise funds
00:12:44.320 for this when's a timeline for it to be built when we get the money okay yeah we prefer to do
00:12:50.880 in the summer but we can't move until we get the money we like i say we we have some money on hand
00:12:55.680 but not nearly enough okay yeah that makes sense okay guys so if you want to donate definitely
00:13:01.360 recommend that we'll also put the address on the screen if you guys need it and the website as well
00:13:06.240 to donate um hope you guys enjoyed this video if you are at all interested in more of our videos
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00:13:22.160 $100 a year. And thank you very much everyone. Have a good night.