Maurice Guillaux - Flying into Harden with Australia's first airmail, 16-18 July 1914
Maurice Guillaux - 50th Anniversary 1964 | Postcards & Philatelics 1913+ | Flying into Harden 1914 | First Australian Aerial Mail flight 1914 | Australia - photographs & film 1914 | Maurice Guillaux in Sydney following his flight from Melbourne, 18 July 1914, standing next to the Post Master General's Department representative. Collection: Powerhouse Museum. 1. Introduction The first official air mail flight in Australia - from Melbourne to Sydney - was undertaken between Thursday 16 and Saturday 18 July 1914 by visiting French stunt pilot Ernest Francois "Maurice" Guillaux (1883-1917) in a Blériot XI monoplane (Dougherty 2014). The aircraft possessed an open monobox frame, a 50 horsepower Gnome engine, and carried 55 litres of fuel enabling it to fly for approximately two hours (Crouch 1982). Whilst performing across the country between April and October 1914, Guillaux was contracted by the Commonwealth Postmaster General’s Department to