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QANTAS logbook
The founding of QANTAS has a very special place in the history of Western Queensland.
In 1919 former Australian Flying Corps officers W Hudson Fysh and Paul McGinness were commissioned by the Commonwealth Department of Defence to survey a route and air strips for the London-to-Sydney Great Air Race. The route ran from Longreach in Queensland, north to the Gulf of Carpentaria, and then to Darwin, via Katherine in the Northern Territory. The 2719 km journey in a Model-T Ford took 51 days to complete.
This experience convinced both men that aeroplanes were the best method of covering the vast distances of North-Western Queensland and linking the State’s western railheads. They also discovered that graziers in the region were sympathetic to their idea, especially given that most roads were impassable in the wet season.
In 1920 Fysh and McGinness formed the Western Queensland Auto Aero Service Limited. On 16 November 1920 the fledgling company was formally registered in Queensland as Queensland and Northern Territory Aerial Services Ltd, (QANTAS).
State Library of Queensland's John Oxley Library collection holds the first logbook for the first QANTAS aircraft, ordered by Fysh and McGinness when they were still operating as The Western Queensland Auto Aero Service Limited.
The logbook is for the Avro 3 seater 504K, aircraft registration G-AUBG, covering the period 22 November 1921 to 14 February 1932. The logbook is signed by the airline’s co-founder Hudson Fysh and records details of registration, names of pilots, dates of flights, duties of pilot, time in the air, hours logged, number of passengers, cargo weight, and maintenance.
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Last updated: 5th February 2008
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