Golden Hawks - History

History

Initially a six-plane team was envisioned as performing for only one year with the Canadair Sabre 5. As originally consisted in 1959, the Golden Hawks had eight RCAF pilots led by Squadron Leader Fern Villeneuve, but the Golden Hawks were so popular after their 1959 show season that the team was re-established for 1960. The team, under the command of LCol Jack Allan, and the lead of S/L Villeneuve, included pilots: F/L James McCombe, F/L Edward Rozdeba, F/L Jeb Kerr, F/L Ralph Annis, F/L Sam Eisler, F/O Jim Holt and F/O William (Bill) Stewart.

In 1961, F/L McCombe became the leader of the team, as Villeneuve left the team when he married. Two deaths altered the makeup of the team: F/O John T. Price joined the Hawks in 1959 after F/O Eisler died, and served as second solo.When F/L Kerr died in a crash in Calgary, F/O John T. Price moved to lead solo.

F/O Stewart's routine was often the one most remembered as lead solo performing the low-level aerobatics that looked to the crowd to be particularly dangerous. The Golden Hawks continued performing for three more seasons until they were disbanded, ostensibly for financial reasons, on February 7, 1964, having flown a total of 317 shows across North America.

Not only did the team perform standard loops and rolls in very tight formation, they also introduced their own trademark maneuvers. The Golden Hawks pioneered a two-aircraft head-on coordinated solo program which virtually every military team since has adopted in various ways. They also invented the Card 5 Maneuver, where five aircraft fly in a card formation, two up front, one in the middle, two in the back. They also created the Coordinated Two Aircraft 360, where two aircraft fly in opposite directions at low level at about 350 miles an hour, at about seven gravities, in a horizontal circle and pass each other on both sides of the circle.

The legacy of the Golden Hawks lives on with the Canadian Forces Snowbirds and the Hawk One demonstration team established at Vintage Wings of Canada in 2009 to celebrate the 100th anniversary of powered flight in Canada.