Post by Dave Homewood on Jul 26, 2006 21:15:29 GMT 12
I recently purchased a magazine from 1964 called Propwash (Vol. 3 No. 1), from 1964. It turned up today.
This was a social magazine of the RNZAF, produced at Ohalea but including contributions from all the bases. This issue is a special one as it was released just before Ohakea's big 1964 Air Force Day airshow, so is packed with info and photos on what was coming, etc. The USAF was flying its F-105's direct from Guam, 4000 miles non-stop (air to air refuelling!).
I wondered if anyone remmebers this magazine or has seen this or other copies? I'm sure it'd be fairly rare now. My copy is in perfect new condition which pleases me.
I was interested to read in this issue that Propwash began in May 1962, under the title of "Open Night Drunk", and the man who started it was an LAC Ossie Osbourne - I wonder if he was any relation (not to the rocker, I mean Os the Skyhawk pilot! ;D)
It states too in a small piece about Bulls that in 1964 the population was 1400 people, and had doubled over the past six years (since 1958) due to the RNZAF building the Airmen's Married Quarters on 43 acres of former farmland there. It aid this new development had added 125 homes to the already exisiting 53 (maybe built in WWII?). And plans were afoot to build 59 more, with a grand total of RNZAF housesat Bulls planned to be 237. Meanwhile at ohakea there were also 84 houses including Transit flats.
Man, the base population must have been huge in the 1960's. It states in an article about the newly refurbished (in 1964) No. 1 Airmen's Mess that the base had 5-600 Airmen to feed alone.
The magazine has some great photos of aircraft in service at the time with the RNZAF and with foreign Air Forces visiting (including a Boeing B-50 on the hardstand at either ohakea or Whenuapai. Now that would have been a site to see. RAF, RAF, USAF and RCAF aircraft are featured, as all were coming to the big show.
Plus there's news and gossip from all the bases, and some jolly interesting features that were trivia then, history now. I'd love to track down some more of these magazines someday. Does anyone know how long it lasted for? Did it become RNZAF News? or was there a long gap?
I had always assumed all the houses were built in wartime, not the late 50's, early 60's.
This was a social magazine of the RNZAF, produced at Ohalea but including contributions from all the bases. This issue is a special one as it was released just before Ohakea's big 1964 Air Force Day airshow, so is packed with info and photos on what was coming, etc. The USAF was flying its F-105's direct from Guam, 4000 miles non-stop (air to air refuelling!).
I wondered if anyone remmebers this magazine or has seen this or other copies? I'm sure it'd be fairly rare now. My copy is in perfect new condition which pleases me.
I was interested to read in this issue that Propwash began in May 1962, under the title of "Open Night Drunk", and the man who started it was an LAC Ossie Osbourne - I wonder if he was any relation (not to the rocker, I mean Os the Skyhawk pilot! ;D)
It states too in a small piece about Bulls that in 1964 the population was 1400 people, and had doubled over the past six years (since 1958) due to the RNZAF building the Airmen's Married Quarters on 43 acres of former farmland there. It aid this new development had added 125 homes to the already exisiting 53 (maybe built in WWII?). And plans were afoot to build 59 more, with a grand total of RNZAF housesat Bulls planned to be 237. Meanwhile at ohakea there were also 84 houses including Transit flats.
Man, the base population must have been huge in the 1960's. It states in an article about the newly refurbished (in 1964) No. 1 Airmen's Mess that the base had 5-600 Airmen to feed alone.
The magazine has some great photos of aircraft in service at the time with the RNZAF and with foreign Air Forces visiting (including a Boeing B-50 on the hardstand at either ohakea or Whenuapai. Now that would have been a site to see. RAF, RAF, USAF and RCAF aircraft are featured, as all were coming to the big show.
Plus there's news and gossip from all the bases, and some jolly interesting features that were trivia then, history now. I'd love to track down some more of these magazines someday. Does anyone know how long it lasted for? Did it become RNZAF News? or was there a long gap?
I had always assumed all the houses were built in wartime, not the late 50's, early 60's.
