Author(s): E C Lougheed (With Contributions from V. C. G. Nielsen, W. C. Seliars and E. A. Jones.)
Publication Date: 2002
Edited:
LAC (Leading Aircraftman) and WOP (Wireless Operator) graduates from the 31st Entry, No. 4 Wireless School, Guelph, May 8, 1942. The background is easily identified as War Memorial Hall from Jones Collection.
A little over 60 years ago in June 1941, the No. 4 Wireless School opened on the campus of the Ontario Agricultural College (OAC), the fourth and last such school in the British Commonwealth Air Training Plan (BCATP). The plan, which began operating in 1940, was an agreement among Britain, Canada, Australia and New Zealand to train aircrew for the nations' air forces. The locating of the Royal Canadian Air Force (RCAF) School on the campus had been opposed by agricultural organizations, the Council of the City of Guelph and George Drew, the leader of the Conservative Opposition in the Provincial Legislature. This opposition had some effect because the entire campus was not taken over as originally planned. The course at Macdonald Institute was cancelled outright; the degree courses at the Ontario Veterinary College and OAC continued but all students had to live off campus. Although the OAC Diploma course was not cancelled ln 1941, lack of students led to its termination after 1942.
In Wireless Schools, the theory and application of radio communication were taught to train Wireless Operators, who then proceeded to Bombing and Gunnery Schools to qualify as Wireless Air Gunners (WAGS). The procedures for selecting, and initial pre-Wireless School training of aircrew changed over time, but those for a hypothetical recruit provide an example. The description of the thinking of the 'hypothetical recruit' is based partly on the reality that he would be eligible for conscription if he quit high school, and that more than half of the recruits in late 1943 were 17 to 18 years old.
The recruit was 17 years old in 1943, still attending high school but not doing very well scholastically through lack of interest, not ability. He lived in a village in Southern Ontario and worked at odd jobs during summer holidays. For reasons unclear even to him (although poor job prospects, threat of conscription for the army, a wish for adventure, and patriotism may have been among them), he decided to join up. He visited the RCAF Recruiting Centre in Hamilton where he signed up and was given instructions to report to the Manning Depot (Pool) in Toronto about a month later.
At the Manning Depot in the Coliseum and grounds of the Canadian National Exhibition, he became one of the possibly 5,000 airmen, all volunteers, training there at one time. After receiving his uniform, other clothing, boots, kitbag, and assigned to a bunk, he began his five weeks of initial acquaintance with things military. He survived medical examinations, inoculations and a vaccination, the removal of one molar, and several haircuts, attended lectures about personal hygiene, and had many opportunities to march about, do rifle drills, learn how to salute ("Long way up and short way down"), be assigned to menial housekeeping jobs, and become friends with other airmen from his designated flight. He also was subject to an aptitude/psychological examination called the RCAF Classification Test, which emphasized the ability to make decisions and learn quickly: a test considered a good measure of potential. He felt good when he marched up to the paymaster's table, saluted, gave his service number, rank, and name, and received pay from his first full-time permanent job. As an Aircraftman second class (AC2) he received $1.30 per day, income-tax free, with a raise in three months when he became an ACL.
At the end of his time at Manning Depot he received good news; he was selected for aircrew, not groundcrew. The bad news was that, like a majority of recruits who wanted to be pilots, he was not to receive pilot training; in his case he was to train as a Wireless Air Gunner. Before he began that specialization, he continued his training in tarmac duty, guarding the airstrip at Malton, and also attended a War Emergency Training Plan (WETP) course which overcame some deficiencies in his basic academic knowledge. Finally, he was posted to No. 4 Wireless School (No. WS) where he became one of an entry of 120, made up of not only other RCAF airmen, but likely airmen from the Commonwealth, and particularly from the Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF) and the Royal New Zealand Air Force (RNZAF). He was then a Leading Aircraftman (LAC), equal to an army Lance Corporal, indicated by a propeller insignia on the upper arms of his uniforms. A white 'flash' inserted in the front fold of his wedge cap indicated aircrew under training.
At OAC, after the official announcement in 1941, buildings were renovated for the new occupants, not only of the WS but also Cookery, Code and Cypher and Radio Mechanics Schools. The last two Schools had relatively few graduates and ceased operation in 1943. Flight Lieutenant Branion, on active service leave from the OAC Nutrition Department, was in charge of the Cookery School, and had assistance in instruction from several departments of OAC.
In the Administration Building (Johnston Hall), walls were removed, partitions put up, and in the area housing airmen the doors were removed, as they were for airmen's quarters in other buildings. In total there was space for 1,241 airmen, mainly of the Wireless School, on the second, third and fourth floors of the Administration Building, on the three floors of Mills Hall, and on the second and third floors of Macdonald Hall. The airmen had a lounge in the basement of Mills Hall, and a lounge and Canteen (presumably wet, that is, serving beer) in the basement of the Administration Building. The mess (dining room) for the airmen was on the first floor of Creelman Hall with the kitchen in the basement. The non-commissioned officers (NCOs), mainly instructors or in administration, lived on the second floor of the Administration Building and on the three floors of Maids' Dormitory, with a lounge and bar in the basement. The male officers' quarters were in Watson Hall with their Mess in the basement and on the third floor.
Airwomen (called WDs for Womens' Division, RCAF) arrived at the School in1941 and took over the work in administration and other general tasks. There was room in Cutten Fields Golf Clubhouse (outside the fence enclosing the School) for 159 airwomen and a lounge on the first floor, and space for 45 WDs on the first floor of Macdonald Hall. The WDs also had their own laundry and lounge room in the basement of the Macdonald Hall Annex. Quarters and lounge for the WD non-commissioned officers were on the second floor of the Cutten Fields Clubhouse. The WD officers' quarters were in the Macdonald Hall Annex; presumably they shared the officers' mess in Watson Hall with the male officers of the Schools.
Classrooms and laboratory space for all of the schools were identified, with a main centre for the Cookery School being the Trent Institute. A structure built by the RCAF, usually called the Armaments Building, had a 28-yard firing range in the basement to familiarize trainees with firearms. On the first floor it contained individual cubicles ('Outstations') in which trainees interacted with radio signals from the instructors during practice and examinations. This temporary structure, now called the Textile and Design Building, is still standing. The old skating rink, with a new 'tarvia' floor, became the Drill Hall. South of the Physics Building there was a paved parade square which was enlarged after some negotiations between the RCAF and President Christie, representing the Ontario Government. The use by the School of an area north of the Drill Hall for skeet shooting to familiarize trainees in leading the target was also negotiated. The Farm Mechanics Building (now Blackwood Hall) was used for storage of clothes, equipment and supplies, and held offices and laboratories for equipment repair, maintenance, testing, and instruction. The equipment included a Boulton-Paul gun turret set up to fire on simulated aircraft targets. The Laundry was maintained for normal washing of clothes, bedding, etc. Some instruction in laundry operations were given by Joseph Hersey, who had managed it for OAC. The Gymnasium (later demolished in the construction of the MacKinnon Building) continued to operate for the airmen as it had for the OAC students previously. The upper floor of War Memorial Hall was used as an auditorium. ln the basement there was an 'Entertainment Centre' staffed by people representing the local Canadian Legion branch and the YWCA.
In this small space of only part of the OAC campus there were approximately 1,500 people on a normal 'working' day. (This number is easily verified; the RCAF paid for the sewage and water services on the basis of the, "Each and every resident and day occupant.") Married instructors and staff lived off campus, so the number was slightly less at night. In this space, beyond that needed for living quarters, instruction, storage and administration, there were other components of a typical RCAF station which had no airfield facilities on site. The Guard House, constructed at the main entrance on what is now Macdonald Street just off Dundas Road (Gordon Street), housed the Service Police (SP) on duty, and had cells for serious offenders of military or sometimes civil laws, whose transgressions warranted more than lesser penalties such as a fine, withholding of privileges, confinement to barracks or station, fatigue duties or extra drill. There was a hospital with a Medical Officer (physician) and nurses for the airmen, and a smaller hospital for WDs, a dental clinic, a Motor Transport Section, a Works and Buildings Section, which included janitors and groundskeepers who normally worked in OAC, and accommodation and offices for Fire and Service Police Sections in Bursar Hall. The Military Post Office (MPO) in the basement of the Administration Building in May 1943, was in charge of Sergeant George Day from Rockwood, a member of the Canadian Postal Corps. In Sparks, a monthly publication of the School, there was a reminder that the correct address was Service Number, Name, Guelph MPO, Ontario. The Headquarters of the School were also in the Administration Building.
Comments in the columns and letters in Sparks indicate a hardworking, happy, and disciplined school. Even the writing of letters from graduates, often on dangerous operations, appears to define the nature of the School as, "Home". Dances were common events. Some were held in the Entertainment Centre; one starred Mart Kenny and his Western Gentlemen. The WDs also hosted dances, and a Valentine's dance may have been of particular significance: an early Sadie Hawkins affair. A dating service was provided for airmen and WDs who where shy and/or lonely. If this service wasn't satisfactory, there was Dorothy Hix to write to, in care of Sparks. The latter 'help-to-the-lovelorn' column was patterned after that of Dorothy Dix, a forerunner of Ann Landers.
The combination of discipline and caring and co-operative attitude gave good results. Under Group Captain (GC)A. H. Keith Russell, the first Commanding Officer, the School won the Minister for Air's Pennant for Efficiency three times. After Russell was succeeded by GC D. Williams in the Spring of 1943, the School was awarded a permanent large solid silver trophy for efficiency.
But not all emphasis was on discipline and efficiency. In Sparks, the columnists made fun of identifiable people (without naming them), and commented on strange occurrences without concern for hurt feelings. One such comment was about an airwoman's greatcoat being stolen from a Sergeant's car in Downtown Guelph. The coat was recovered. Someone ever made quiet fun of GC Russell who, while carving up the turkey, used the seat of his white (cook's) trousers as a towel during the New Year's dinner of 1943. According to tradition, the officers and senior NCOs served the men unfortunate enough to be on the station at this holiday time. Another mention in Sparks is of a flight leader who had his flight do an 'eyes right' salute for a taxi driver in front of Macdonald Institute, and previously hailed a Squadron Leader as a taxi driver in front of the King Eddie Hotel.
Sports were an important part of the airmen's lives. Some airmen, talented in sports in which there were competitions among RCAF units, replaced required drill or fatigue duty with practice or competitions. Ewart A. Jones was one of the lucky ones who played basketball well. "Vic" Nielsen recalls some Australians, who had little or no experience skating, let alone playing hockey, challenging the best hockey team to a game. Hockey was an RCAF area sport and a hockey rink in Galt was rented for 'home' games because there were none available in Guelph. Nielsen also remembers the No. 4 softball team which won the area championship, and Desjardins Ball, invented by Sergeant Desjardins, which apparently allowed any kind of physical force to score against the opposing team. To quote from a poem in Sparks, - "To make Airmen tough and Airmen tall, you can't beat the game 'Desjardins Ball'".
Advertising selected from Sparks, the monthly publication of No. 4 Wireless School. (From the Nielson Collection).
Many businesses advertised in Sparks; obviously airmen and WDs were desirable customers. The staff living in the City and the surrounding area contributed to the community, not only as customers, but socially. The trainees had only a little time to interact with the city and its people and many, like "Eddie" Traynor, made the most of the brief opportunity. He described the Downtown as lacking in evening entertainment but mentioned a dance hall above Ryan's where bands such as Willis Tipping's played, and a hall above the King Edward Hotel which had a juke box and a dance floor. Within his brief time at No. 4 WS, he met and wooed Elma Delaney; the couple were married by Father John Lardie, who later became a chaplain at the School. (Father Lardie served overseas and flew on a few bomber missions until grounded by his Commanding Officer.) Traynor retired in 1987 from RCA and returned to Guelph to live. (For a good description of Downtown Guelph at the time, see Mary Fountain's article in the 2001 issue of Historic Guelph. She describes Ryan's store particularly well and mentions the attendance of, "Young airmen," from the OAC campus, only slightly older than she was, who attended the dances in Ryan's Auditorium). A disastrous fire in the OAC beef cattle barn on the cold night of March 20, 1942, helped to improve relations between the School and OAC as well as the City. An airman returning from the City reported the flames to the SP in the Guard House, who alerted the barracks and the Guelph police and firemen. The fire could not be controlled, but the volunteer airmen, some with farm experience, helped to walk the animals from the burning barn and the threatened horse barn nearby to safety. In the OAC Annual Report for the fiscal year 1941-1942, President Christie described, with gratitude, the efforts of the airmen and those who manned the wireless school fire fighting equipment.
W.C. ("Paddy") Sellars is an example of the staff who had more time than the trainees to become acquainted with Guelph and its people. He was born in St. John's in Newfoundland; the nickname "Paddy" was from his accent, thought to be Irish. In early 1940, he joined the RCAF in Halifax and was posted to the Manning Depot in Toronto for his basic training. Because of Newfoundland experience as a ham radio operator, and in radio generally, he was posted to the just-opening No. 1 WS in Montreal. Almost immediately he became an Instructor. After about a year there, he and some other Instructors from No. 1 WS volunteered to transfer to Guelph to set up No. 4 WS, despite some misgivings because Guelph had a reputation as a Gunners' Town and were unlikely to accept airmen easily. His and their attitudes changed quickly as they became familiar with Guelph. Sellars has many happy memories which began even before the School opened for business, with him having afternoon tea with OAC President Christie and his family, whose home was within the fenced area of the campus. He also became good friends with Fred Hammond whose company's radio products were often critical to the work of the School. Sellars attended Paisley Memorial United Church; one of his good friends from the church was Gordon Couling, known so well as a teacher and artist and for his work in documenting Guelph's architecture.
Corporals W.C. Sellars and J.W. Wilkes repairing apparatus in preparation for the opening of No. 4 WS. (From the Guelph Mercury, June 10, 1941; published with permission).
Sellars' main responsibility was to manage records for all trainees and to give them a tough individual final examination of their ability to use the current radio sets and to maintain and repair radio equipment. His requests for re-mustering the aircrew so he could share in the risks of the trainees were always denied. In 1943 he was commissioned and posted to No. 3 WS in Winnipeg. After leaving the RCAF in October 1945, he became a minister in the United Church. He later retired to go farming, and now really retired, retains his interest in Guelph, the campus and No. 4 WS.
At the Wireless School instruction was received in mathematics, Morse Code, voice messages, electric, electronic and radio principles, problems and repairs, aircraft radio equipment used by the RCAF and RAF, aircraft identification and skeet shooting. Members of the Physics Department of OAC were involved in the instruction of the airmen. Practice in aircrafts were initially at Burtch (near Brantford) in the Flying Squadron attached to the School. Beginning in 1943, this practical training was given at No. 9 Elementary Flying Training School at St. Catharines'. The Wireless Operator's course lasted from 18 to 20 weeks in the beginning but was extended to 28 weeks when the initial training period was found inadequate.
The trainee 'Entries' (classes), each planned as 120 airmen, were numbered from 21 to 97 using only the odd numbers. The numbered Entries became Squadrons, which were divided into flights, each of approximately 30 airmen. The first Entry graduated in November 1941.; the last in December 1944. Approximately 90 percent completed the course successfully. This high proportion is a measure of the capability and dedication of the airmen and the instructors, as well as the success of the administration's leadership. Those trainees who failed could become Air Gunners or re-muster to a groundcrew trade.
Most graduates qualified as Wireless Operators (WOPs) and were posted to a Bombing and Gunnery School (B&GS). Upon successful completion of that course, they were qualified Wireless Air Gunners (WAGs). The top ten or 15 WOP graduates of Entries were permitted to transfer to the Navigator trade. Some of the graduates from Wireless Schools who had good records and proper temperament were selected as wireless instructors. A few were classified as a Wireless Operator Ground (WOG). Such airmen operated ground stations. This classification meant that they were effective in sending and receiving messages, but not satisfactory in diagnosing instrument problems and making repairs. A few thousand feet up over enemy territory, there were none to help the WAG; he had to solve instrument problems quickly himself.
The next step for all aircrew graduates was posting to an Operational Training Unit (OTU) where they were trained in a particular aircraft under operational conditions. Only about ten percent of the approximately 130,000 BCATP graduates were trained in the seven OTUs in Canada. The other 90 percent, and particularly those who were to join Bomber Command, were posted to Bournemouth in England for transfer to an OTU in the UK.
The careers of three graduates, all with a close relationship to Guelph, demonstrate the cosmopolitan nature of the BCATP trainees and their careers after the RCAF.
The Honourable Lincoln Alexander, who graduated from the School as a Wireless Operator Ground, is probably the best-known graduate to Guelphites. After his RCAF career, and earning BA and law degrees, he practised law in Hamilton where he had grown up. He was elected to the House of Commons in 1968 as the member for Hamilton West, served as the Federal Minister of Labour for 1979, and as Chair of the Workman's Compensation Board for Ontario. His appointment to Lieutenant Governor of Ontario came in 1985. He is currently serving his third term as Chancellor of the University of Guelph, where he has always been popular with students, faculty, and staff. An Alexander Scholarship has just been set up there in his name. A very recent award is his inclusion in MacLean's 2001 Honour Roll, one of the 12 so honoured. In addition, he has a very public honour in that the expressway across the top of the City of Hamilton is called the Lincoln M. Alexander Parkway, shortened to, "The Linc," representing Alexander's informality.
Victor ("Vic") C.G. Nielsen organized the first (in 1987) and succeeding reunions of the No. 4 Wireless Association. He has continued to organize the meetings, now of the RCAF Wireless School Association which includes graduates of the four schools. He serves as the archivist and historian for No. 4 Wireless School particularly, but he has accumulated documentation for all the Wireless Schools.
Vic Nielson, a young 83-year-old, ready for the 2001 Wireless School Reunion in Guelph.
Resident in Toronto, in 1939, he joined the Army and trained at Camp Borden. With a great deal of difficulty, he re-mustered to the RCAF, spent two weeks at Manning Depot and graduated near the top of his class in electronics at the Royal Military College, Kingston. He then graduated from the Radar School at Clinton and served for two years as a Radar Mechanic in the RAF near Chester, England, installing and air testing radar equipment in de Haviland Mosquitos and Bristol Beaufighters. He re-mustered to aircrew with the hope of becoming a pilot and returned to Canada. Like many others, his hope was not to be, and he entered the 85th Entry of No. 4 WS. After graduating as a WOP and from No. 2 B&G School in Mossbank, Saskatchewan, with a commission (he entered that School as a Sergeant), he refused a position as an instructor to go overseas and serve with RAF 108 Squadron as a Wireless Navigator. With the end of the war in Europe in sight, he volunteered to return to Canada to train in Avro Lancaster bombers for the campaign against Japan. Two atomic bombs ended that campaign quickly, and Nielsen retired from the RCAF.
After the war, he attended Rehabilitation School for about four months as a preliminary step to university. However, family responsibilities required that he go to work. His first job as a salesman for sporting goods lasted for 45 years. He began working out of Toronto but an opportunity in Northern Ontario led him to locate in North Bay where he currently lives, still archivist and reunion organizer and an ardent stamp collector and fisherman. Among Nielsen's many recollections are sad memories of widows and sons and daughters of graduates, who attended the Wireless School reunions to find someone who could tell them something about their husbands or fathers killed in action overseas.
Ewart A. Jones, one of the approximately 10,000 Americans trained in the BCATR joined the RCAF in Montreal in 1941, when he was 18-years-old. After Manning Depot at Lachine, he served briefly as a guard in Moncton. In the fall of 1941, he was in the 31st Entry of No. 4 WS, and as a WOP on May 8, 1942, won the Commanding Officer's shield for, "General proficiency." After completion of the gunnery course at No. 7 B&GS in Paulson, Manitoba, he became a commissioned WAG. At the OTU in Debert, NS, and in Dorval, he was one of a crew training for flying a new Lockheed Hudson across the North Atlantic to the UK. He trained at an OTU in Silloth, Northem England, in Lockheed Hudsons, and served for about nine months in 233 RAF Coastal Command Squadron flying from Gibraltar on coastal escort duty. He then returned to Silloth as an instructor in wireless for the RAF Women's Auxiliary. On his return to Canada in 1944, he became an instructor in an OTU in Patricia Bay and Comox in B.C. He became a Canadian citizen and began studies toward a degree in Dentistry at the University of Toronto. In the beginning of his second year, he married a Guelph girl, Ruth Cooke. Upon graduation he settled down to a dental practice in Guelph.
Other graduates from different places served in various dangerous locations, not necessarily in their own air force or directly defending their own country. Carl Sollows from Tiverton, NS, and Bill Alexander were in 203 RAF Bomber Squadron based in Ceylon. Jack Ladly flew with the 517 RAF Meteorological Squadron and signalled a weather report that delayed D-Day from the planned June 5, 1944, to June 6th. Frank Russell flew in the 433 RCAF Bomber Squadron based in Skipton-on-Swale, England. Harold V. Lamb, probably an Australian serving in the RAF, had some experience in Ferry Command, and was then selected with four other graduates from No. 4 WS, Ken Shergood, Arthur Jones, Gordon Seward, and Ken McKay, for a ferry service from the United States across the South Atlantic to Africa. Walter Walker of the RAAF was serving in an OTU in RAF Bomber Command in England with two-engined bombers (probably Vickers Wellingtons) and hoped to be moving into the four-engined bombers soon. From somewhere (letters censored) in Australia, J. Montgomery of the RAAF reported that he was flying Lockheed Hudsons' bombing the invading Japanese, presumably from a base in Northern Australia.
On February 22, 1945, the facilities used by the School were returned to OAC. An estimated 5,000 airmen graduated during the approximately 40 months of the School's operation. Barris, in writing specifically about WAGs and No. 4 WS indicated that statistically one in three of the graduates would be killed in, or from, battle. Morton wrote that the RCAF lost 17,101 airmen in action in World War II. Of that number, 9,980 were killed in bombers of the RAF and RCAF sent into the night skies over Europe in 1942-1943. Through early 1944, the larger bombers had a crew of six or seven with at least one of them being a WAG. Greenhouse and Halliday provide information about the 9,980 lost in Bomber Command with terrible simplicity. They estimate that at an attrition rate of five percent, the upper psychologically acceptable limit, only 20 of 100 crews would survive the 30 sorties required for a tour of duty. The level often reached or slightly exceeded this rate. At the rate of 9.8 percent occurring in a few units in January 1944, the chance of survival of a crew became one in 20. With such losses and those of other graduates serving in many other dangerous locations, well over 1,000 of the 5,000 WAGs who passed through No. 4 WS never came home.
Many WAGs received citations and medals for heroism and efforts above and beyond normal duty. There was also the courage of the many unsung graduates, however, who did their duty because of belief in the cause, a youthful sense of their own immortality, and perhaps most of all, a loyalty ("Esprit de corps") to crew and squadron.
Guelph has a legitimate and longstanding claim to the name 'Gunner Town.' No. 4 Wireless School contributes to that reputation. Most Wireless School graduates became Wireless Air Gunners; a very different environment, but still GUNNERS.
The site of the Wireless School is already marked, not by a grateful government or public, but by the No. 4 Wireless School Association. The text of the plaque, given to the University in 1988 in a very moving ceremony as part of that year's Association reunion, is located on the south wall of the portico at the main entrance of Johnston Hall, and reads:
"THE MEMBERS OF THE NO. 4 WIRELESS SCHOOL ASSOCIATION DEDICATED THIS PLAQUE JUNE 25, 1988,
TO COMMEMORATE THE BRITISH COMMONWEALIH AIR TRAINING PLAN
THAT WAS LOCATED ON THIS CAMPUS (1941-1945)
AND TO HONOUR THE MEMORY OF THEIR COMRADES
WHO DIED IN THE SERVICE OF THEIR COUNTRY DURING WORLD WAR II."
On campus, the current Textiles and Design building, the temporary structure built for the Wireless School as an Armaments Building, bears no sign as to its origins which could remind the passersby of the airmen who used it many years ago. There is also a portrait of an Airman by Evan Macdonald in storage in the Macdonald Stewart Art Centre which, "Commemorates the thousands of young men trained here at the RCAF Wireless School," but it is not displayed anywhere.
In September 1938, Britain's Prime Minister, Neville Chamberlain, returned from Munich with an agreement that he reported meant, "Peace for our time." He was terribly wrong; that did not come about until the end of WWII. The latter, "Peace for our time," was paid for by men like those who began training at No. 4 Wireless School some 60 years ago.
OAC Campus during tenure of No. 4 Wireless School (1941-1945). Dotted line indicates security fence erected at that time.
SOURCES:
Anonymous. 2001. A friend to all. The Guelph Tribune, December 1, 16.
Anonymous. 2001. Scholarship to be named in Chancellor's honour. The Guelph Mercury, November 4, 43.
Barris, T. 1992. Behind the glory. MacMillan. Toronto
Braida, J.R.H. 2000. "The Royal City at War: The military mobilization of Guelph, Ontario during the first 18 months of the Second World War." Canadian Military History 9 (2): 25-42.
Christie, G.I. President OAC, 1928-1947. Collection of newspaper clippings, correspondence, and other information about No. 4 Wireless School in Archives and Special Collections, University of Guelph Library. See particularly from the Guelph Mercury, D'Alton, 1987 and 1988, and Kirsch, 1998; from the Guelph Royal Tribune, Sapelak, 1988. Also see the 1944 campus plan with legend which lists the use and capacities of buildings.
Douglas, W.A.B. 1986. "The creation of a national air force." The official history of the Royal Canadian Air Force Volume II, Part II: The British Commonwealth Air Training Plan. University of Toronto Press.
Dunmore, S. 1994. Wings for victory. McClelland and Stewart. Toronto.
Findlay (Sergeant), A.L. (Ed.). Sparks. Seven issues between August 1942 and August 1943. No. 4 Wireless School Guelph. Nielsen Collection.
Fountain, Mary L. 2001. Mid-2Oth Century Downtown Guelph in Brooks, Barbara R. (Ed.). Historic Guelph: The Royal City. Vol. XI; 3-13.
Gerard, W. 2001. "Call me Linc": Celebrating a Canadian icon. The Toronto Stat, December 8, 43.
Greenhous, B., and Halliday, H.A. 1999. Canada's Air Forces 1914-1999. Art Global. Montreal.
Hatch, F.J. 1983. The Aerodrome of Democracy: Canada and the British Commonwealth Air Training Plan, 1939-L945. Directorate of History, Department of National Defence, Ottawa.
Hersey, I. 1994 to 2002. Conversations with the author.
Jones, E.A. 2001. "Transcript" of September interview.
Laplaunte, 8. 1991. 50 years later. One man's memories of a 'wonderful city'. In Folktales, Guelph Daily Mercury, June 13, 1991, 34. (W.C. Sellars was the "one man".) Sellars Collection.
Lougheed, E.C., with contributions from V.C.G. Nielsen, W.C. Sellars and E.A. Jones. 2002. No. 4 Wireless School Guelph June 1941-February 1945. Text complete but not yet published.
Matheson, Dawn, and Anderson, Rosemary (Ecls.). 2000. Guelph: perspectives on a century of change 1900-2000. Guelph Historical Society, Guelph.
McDonald, Virginia. 2001. Tribute to Alexander the Great. The Guelph Tribune. December 11, 16.
Mortory, D. 1994. A short history of Canada. Second revised edition. McClelland & Stewart. Toronto.
Nielsen, V.C.G. 2001. Text of correspondence, telephone calls and one meeting.
Oakes, G. 1996. "Gunner town, a brief history of the 11th Field Regiment. In Whiteley, Marilim F. (Ecl.)," Historic Guelph: The Royal City Vol. XXXI: 29-44.
Ontario Agricultural College, Annual Reports 1941 to 1945.
Patrick, K.R. (Squadron Leader, Chief Instructor). 1941. Wireless Air Gunner's Handbook, 1st Edition. No. 1 Wireless School, Montreal. Nielsen Collection.
Ross, A.M. 1974. The College on the Hill. Copp Clark. Toronto.
Sellars, W.C. 1991. "In praise of Guelph. Written for the 1991 Reunion of No. 4 Wireless School." Sellars collection; see Laplaunte above for an appreciation.
Sellars, W.C. 1992. No. 4 Wireless School, RCAF. Notes on its beginnings. Sellars Collection.
Sellars, W.C. 2001. Correspondence, including a summary of career with the United Church.