Thomas Lamb

Tom Lamb, LL.D.(Hon.), was born on June 29, 1898 at Grand Rapids, Manitoba, the second of eleven children. In July, 1900 the family moved to remote Moose Lake, "where his father established a fur trading business. They built a log cabin and store near a Cree reservation to trade "with the local trappers.

Young Tom Lamb grew up with Cree children as companions and learned to speak their language fluently. He learned from the elders about their culture, including survival techniques; building birch bark canoes; boiling spruce gum into pitch; making fishing nets and spears. He would call upon these skills years later to survive in the North.

There were no schools in this isolated region; attracting teachers to the area was very difficult. As the Lamb brothers grew older, they were needed to help in their father's fishing camps. By the end of third grade, young Tom's school days were over. But his life-learning was just beginning.

Before he was 10, he was accompanying his father on his fish haul operations with horse-drawn sleighs, learning about survival in extremely cold temperatures. Some trips lasted more than a week. He was sent on trading missions by dogsled with strict instructions on how to trade. On these trips, he learned that the horses and dogs always had to be cared for first.

By the age of 11, his father had trained him as a teamster on his fish-hauls, and sent him out as team leader. These long hauls were 'hell on earth', as he described them: sleet storms and blizzards; high snowdrifts to be carved out; gruelling portages; repairing smashed sleighs; and the constant risk of crashing through thinning ice. Indians who "worked for his father looked out for the young teamster on these trips. Young Tom was handling his father's boats by age 17. He took on jobs as boat builder, carpenter, sawmill operator and as engineer on other freighting boats.

Having mastered many skills and overcome obstacles that would have stopped most men, he was ready to set out on his own. He married Jean Armstrong in 1924. They built their home at Moose Lake and they raised three daughters and six sons, each of whom participated in the various companies he established.

After buying out his father's fur business and trading post in 1926, he set up a saw mill and planer, and built houses and a school for the natives on the Moose Lake Reserve.

By the late 1920's Lamb became alarmed at the population decline of beaver and muskrat, the main fur animals, due to low water levels and over-trapping. He conceived a muskrat restoration plan, and in 1931 he leased 54,000 acres of swampy land near Moose Lake. Where only forty muskrat houses had existed, after five years of intensive effort, nearly 5,000 were counted. Thus Lamb pioneered methods of conservation and development for the North's fur industry.

He expanded his commercial fishing operations. For many years, he hauled thousands of tons of frozen whitefish from remote lakes to The Pas and Cormorant Lake railroad siding, with up to 12 teams of horses. He introduced caterpillar tractors in 1930, but the northern winters still imposed costly delays.

In 1931, during one of these fish-hauls, his tractor got stuck in the slush about 20 miles from the railway siding. A bush pilot, seeing the trouble Lamb was in, landed. Lamb hired him to fly his fish to Cormorant siding, the first time that fresh fish was hauled by airplane in Northern Manitoba.

Lamb was so impressed with the efficiency of this that he decided to buy his own airplane. He bought a Stinson, CF-AUS, in Winnipeg in 1935, and hired a pilot and engineer. Lamb Airways was formally incorporated that year. The following year, he built barges and a tug boat, the Skippy-L, for summer freighting, and established Lamb Transport, a much-needed service in the area.

As word got out that Lamb had an airplane for hire at The Pas, his pilot was kept very busy hauling fresh fish and doing general charter work, flying missions for both government and private customers, the RCMP, and medevacs that saved many lives.

Lamb decided to fly his own plane. He got his commercial licence in 1937 and became an adept pilot, at home on skis or floats. He could get his plane in and out of the most difficult spaces, in the worst weather; he could find the tiniest Inuit village in the trackless barrens.

Lamb expanded his fleet of aircraft, and bought his first Norseman in 1946, all equipped with floats and skis. The Norseman allowed Lamb to conduct flights further into the Arctic. Winter was a challenge, navigating across the whiteness of the barren lands, looking for the small dark spot of a camp or village. The Norseman was used in 1952 in support of the Canadian Geological Survey in the Northwest Territories.

In the 1950's, Lamb was chartered by the Federal Government to take doctors, along with food and supplies, to Inuit camps along the Kazan and Thelon Rivers. These Inuit were starving, and needed medical attention.

By the early 1950's, several of his sons had their pilot licences and were also trained as airplane mechanics. Lamb passed on to them his hard-won experience in the airmanship they needed to fly in arduous weather and terrain.

By the mid 1950's, all six sons, Greg, Donald, Dennis, Jack, Doug and Conrad were flying for Lamb Airways. One amazed client recalled,

“Every one of those boys can do everything that's needed to be done up here in the North. They fly planes like they were born with wings. They run freight boats and sawmills, build roads and sleighs and boats, repair tractors and plane engines. Tom Lamb brought up his boys to tackle any job, no matter how tough it is. He expected nothing less of his boys than he expected of himself.”

Often, one could witness Tom Lamb and his sons taking off one after the other on varied missions. Since 1935, the company's logo was "Do not ask us where we fly, tell us where you want to go." Scheduled and charter operations were conducted in Northern Manitoba, throughout the Central Arctic, and to Baffin Island, Sable Island, Greenland, the Yukon and Alaska.

Lamb's airline operation was involved in every major construction project in Northern Manitoba and the Central Arctic. It flew geologists for the first surveys in 1949 which discovered large nickel deposits at Thompson, Manitoba, about 400 km NE of The Pas. During the mid 1950's, the development of International Nickel's mine, building the railroad and highways and construction of Manitoba hydro generating stations and power lines kept Lamb Airways busy. All of these demanded and received reliable air service. In 1965 Lamb changed the company name to Lambair.

In 1953 Lamb, with his enthusiasm for conquering new frontiers, proved yet another point: that cattle ranching could be carried out successfully above the 53rd parallel. Ever the entrepreneur, lie realized a long-time dream when he cleared the brush, broke the land and raised more than 500 head of purebred Hereford cattle on his 5000 acre 7 Bar L ranch on the shores of Moose Lake.

On May 22, 1969 Lamb was presented with an Honorary Doctor of Laws degree from the University of Manitoba, 'in recognition of distinguished public service'. He had earned this distinction as a pioneering frontiersman. As a far-sighted businessman, he was unequaled by any other bush-raised Canadian.

Tom Lamb died on December 31st, 1969, in Honolulu at the age of 71. His sons carried on with Lambair until 1981, when it ceased operations, and the Lamb Store was sold in 1997 after 97 years of continuous service.

The Lamb family has accepted several awards on his behalf, such as the Leo Mol bronze sculpture of Tom Lamb, the Nunavut Government award in 2007, and the Manitoba Aviation Council 'Pioneer of Flight' award in 2008. The Mawdesley Wildlife area was renamed the Tom Lamb Wildlife Management Area. The Pas Airport was unofficially declared 'Tom Lamb Field'.

Thomas Lamb was inducted as a Member of Canada's Aviation Hall of Fame at ceremonies held in Wetaskiwin, Alberta on May 30, 2009.