Little did she know, Bernice Blonarwitz owned the final piece of the puzzle in a re-construction of a rare Second World War aircraft that will soon arrive in Comox.
Bernice and her late husband, Lyle Hendry, inherited a windshield from a plane crash that a friend had found in the woods nearly 50 years ago in northern Quebec. The couple’s friend, Ed Wood, initially intended to have the windshield made into a side table.
“Lyle was a very good woodworker,” Bernice said. “Ed asked if he could make a cradle to support the windshield. It was extremely difficult because of the shape and the weight.”
The windshield wound up in their workshop, where it sat for about 10 years until Lyle passed away in 2011. Bernice donated it to the Comox Air Force Museum, and never thought much about it. But a few months ago, she paid her first visit to the museum. Figuring she would see it in a display, she asked about the windshield, and was told that it had been installed in the Y2K Spitfire that would be flying across Canada and stopping in Comox this summer.
“That was the last piece of the puzzle to get the Spitfire up and running,” she said, referring to a comment from Jon Ambler, the museum’s program manager. “That really made my day.”
Efforts to re-construct the Y2K Spitfire began in Comox nearly 20 years ago. The plane has been in Gatineau, Que. the past few years for wing assembly, finishing work and test flying. It’s scheduled to arrive in Comox early-August for a Y2K Homecoming Celebration. There will be a flypass over the Comox Marina on BC Day Monday, Aug. 6. The Spitfire will then be the centrepiece of an Aug. 8 banquet at 14 Hangar at the base. The guest of honour will be Comox resident Stocky Edwards, a decorated Second World War fighter pilot.
FMI: www.y2kspitfire.ca