Interesting Bombardier Cover (Help)

Going through a box of covers and found this. Appears to be signed by...RA Huntel James Bates and Juc Kelly Leader cancel says something like Arctic Red III NWT Trying to figure out what this is. A First Flight Cover?

Hi mate,
We have A global company here in Australia called Bombardier and they build heavy vehicles and trains, could be a specialist vehicle?

Cheers

This is odd. My first appartment was at 8853A De Provence in St- Leonard. It is a mostly italian community in Montreal. Bombardier is a huge comany in Canada.

The same company is stationed here in the States and in West Europe, doing the same. I hae never seen that logo though, but that does not mean much

Peter

I am half Canadian so I have heard all about Bombardier air division... I just cannot figure out what this cover is supposed to commemorate or the connection to the Northwest Territories. I googled the 3 names and nothing seemed to come up

Jan Bata is from the Bata Family in Toronto, owner of Bata Shoes a very large company based in Toronto. Search Bata Shoe Museum in Toronto.

They also made snowmobiles

I've been to the Shoe Museum! Toronto is my favorite city in the world to visit... about 4 hours away.

While I can't read the date on your cover, I believe that it was a souvenir of Ralph Plaisted's expedition to reach the North Pole using Bombardier snowmobiles. The 43 day trip took place in 1968 and started on March 9th. I think the cancel is Arctic Red River, NWT.

Stuart...what does Jan Bata have to do with the cover?...am I missing something here?

I think the signature I read as James Bates he is reading as Bata?

In late 1963 I was posted to the US airforce base at Hopedale Labrador. The main base was involved in aircraft control and warning but I worked at the BMEWS link station several kilometres away. I loved it when there was heavy snow when I went on shift because we would use the Bombadier snow mobile rather than a Ford truck. The Bombadier could seat 6 people, totally enclosed. The viehicle had full tracks and direction and speed was controlled by a lever for each track. It comes as no shock to me that Bombadier was in business up in NWT. Bombadier went on from there with its Skidoo line.

Bombardier while probably best known for their snow vehicles such as ski-doo snowmobiles and if anyone has gone on guided ice fishing trips the full track vehicles buzzing across the lakes, they also manufacture aircraft. Most probably a signed philatelic flight cover.

Bombadier didn't get into aircraft until 1986 when it bought Canadair from the Canadian government so, given the Centennial definitive on the cover, it would not relate to aircraft business. I think the postmark is 1972. Given the March postmark, that would be a great time to be selling snow transportation vehicles up in NWT.