Last winter this column made mention that on Oct. 15, 1941 the community had a “grim reminder that was was a deadly business when a bomber plane of the Royal canadian Air Force, en route from Halifax, Nova Scotia to Toronto, Ontario, carried three young Canadian flyers to their death here. The big bomber circled over this village obviously seeking a landing area for more than an hour during a driving snowstorm, which cut visibility to a minimum. Its desperate crew tried to land it in the marsh at the foot of Big Tupper Lake, the plane disintegrating in the crash and killing all three instantly.”
After describing how two local men, Henry and Wilmer LaVoy, successfully salvaged the motors of that bomber following the failed effort of Canadian military salvage crews, we noted there was some speculation that the bomber may not have been a Lockheed Hudson as reported but rather a British Bristol Beaufort.
Fast forward now to a fascinating letter that I just received from former resident Ed Brusig, who now lives in Washington State. The Brusig family lived directly across from the high school, a section of town known as Sears Hill. The family had settled in Tupper to be near their father, who was an early patient of Federal Hospital No. 96 as Sunmount was originally termed. (Sunmount at that time was a hospital devoted to the care of disabled veterans of America’s Armed Forces.)
Ed and his brother, Adolph (Buba), both graduated from Tupper Lake High School in the mid 1940s, where they were popular and active members of the student body. Following graduation, the Brusig brothers fought in World War II, and this summer both brothers returned for the Moaner Reunion. Buba, from California, and Eddie, from Washington State, where they now live, had successful careers in industry and aviation.
Segments of Eddie’s recent letter to me follows. He describes the wonderful time he had at the reunion and adds:
My sister gave me a year’s worth of old copies of the “Free Press” and I’ve been going through them one by one. The one of Wednesday, Feb. 11, 1998 caught my eye since it described an incident which I was familiar with. The plane that crashed in the marsh was a Lockheed Hudson of the RCAF as Louie Simmons stated. The date I don’t remember, but if Louie says it was Oct. 25, 1941, then that’s close enough.
I remember hearing the noise of the twin engines, running outside our house opposite the high school and seeing the Lockheed Hudson (which had twin engines and rudders) fly real low in a light snowstorm.
If Herb Trimm (I knew him in school) says it was a British Bristol Beaufort, I think he was wrong.
I knew my planes very well back in 1941, thank you. I made scores of model airplanes then as 14-year-old.
Back in those days in school we used to have to perform in skits for auditorium. Tableaus, I think, they called them. You remember the time I had one big tableau scene? I was a young kid holding a Lockheed P-38 up with one hand gazing up into the wild blue yonder. Talk about memories! I never forgot my memories of Tupper Lake But to dream of Lockheed and then to actually work for them 19 years later — for 27 years — is really mind boggling. Before Lockheed I worked as a designer for General Electric, American Locomotive Co., and Link Aviation. Then I worked as a Senior Design Engineer for Convair San Diego for five years.
While employed by Lockheed, we spent five years in Scotland, from 1975 to 1978 and from 1985 to 1987. In our last tour, ‘85 to ‘87, I had a good Scottish friend with whom I hiked the Bens and Moors of Scotland. He told me of a plane wreckage up in Ben Lui at about the 3,000-ft. level. One day we made a hike (in 1986) of about 4 miles to reach the spot, and wouldn’t you know it, it was a Lockheed Hudson! I took the numbers down from the tail section and took a lot of pictures, which I have here at home.
Anyhow, my friend Alan gave me the details as he knew them. The plane crashed in 1946 after the war, and no one was injured as they bailed out.
Well, I wrote to the British Aircraft Museum at Hendon, England, where they keep records, and asked them for the details of that numbered aircraft. A couple weeks later we had the answer. The plane was only a couple months old when delivered to Scotland. A crew of 7 (I think) were flying training flights around Scotland to get acquainted with the Bendix Radio Directional Finder, which was a new piece of equipment. The time was October 1941 (not 1946), and when it slammed into Ben Lui, all the crew died. So, my friend Alan now had a different perspective of what happened 45 years before. He said, “It had to take an American to come over here to set things right.” I could write a book about my experiences in Scotland but I have been going on too much now in this letter.
Recollecting the crash in Tupper Lake in 1941, I also put on my boots the next day and tramped out to the wreckage. I think I pried off a bit myself.
When we found the wreckage on Ben Lui in Scotland, I picked up a piece of wreckage myself and stuck it in my pack. Upon investigation I deduced that it was the Radio Directional Finder antenna. The part that caused the crash, according to the letter from the British Aircraft Museum, due to the unfamiliarity of the crew with the R.D.F. I have it now out in the garage.
Your friend,
Ed Brusig
P.S. While I was watching the Lockheed Hudson go to its doom in Tupper Lake in October 1941, a similar crash was happening at the same time on Ben Lui in Scotland. Weird, wasn’t it?

We are leaving now for Arizona for six months. Our address there is Mesa Regal RV Resort, #1645, 4700 Main St, Mesa, Arizona 85205.