Gnowangerup History

Ross Mill, Frank Fawkes and George Aylmore were very keen on gliding and decided to build a glider themselves.
After some time working long hours seven days a week, Ross and Frank decided to take Sundays off. They had been interested in the design of gliders, and decided to make that their Sunday hobby.

The first glider flight in Australia took place in 1909 in NSW, but it was not until 1930 that a flight took place in Western Australia at the Maylands Aerodrome. The key gliding sites and years in which clubs were formed in the state include: Gnowangerup, Albany, Bunbury, Northam (1936), Toodyay (1934), Tammin, Cunderdin, York, Beverley, Pingelly (1931), Kulin, Moora, Tenindewa, Geraldton, Rudd’s Gully, In the metropolitan area: Lake Pinjar 1937), Lake Joondalup, Caversham (1945), City Beach, Subiaco (1929), Maylands c1930), Leighton Beach, Fremantle (1930) and Perth.  Pingelly was one of the first gliding clubs to be formed in 1929. 

Ross and Frank contacted the Gliding Club of Western Australia  and obtained tracings of the Rhon Ranger and had a set of prints made. In the four months it took to build, they joined the club and trained up to the ‘low hop stage’. They were still very busy with work, but found the time to make the 371 kilometre trip up to Caversham.

They had met up with George Aylmore of Gnowangerup. George, ex-RAAF and a keen pilot owned a Gypsy Moth but also became very interested in gliding. In 1952 George, Ross and Frank teamed up to build and later fly a glider.

Geoff Higginson inspected the finished glider and commented “They had made a creditable and workmanlike job of the construction and it looked clean and airworthy”

The ‘gliding paddock’ lay a couple of miles from their house. Gates from two or three fences had been removed to allow over a kilometre of space to launch the glider.

Some clumps of trees also presented a slight obstacle as the tow car veered in an arc while hurtling through the aforementioned gates which, owing to a small oversight on the part of the original settlers, did not line up.” (On Silent Wings Gliding in Western Australia the Early Years by Stephen Hunt and Gloria Baird p 118)

Between 1952 and 1954 the Rohn was in constant use, with an estimated 15 flights per day. George logged 150 flights.

There were the usual share of mishaps – Ross was dumped by a willy-willy and Frank had to make an emergency landing , fortunately taking advantage of some soft sand. George was joining a circuit when a sea breeze front came in – he kept the glider hovering at about 100 feet (30.8 metres) above the ground until the main front had passed and was able to execute a safe landing.