CP Air Memorabilia

Collecting of airline memorabilia has (pardon the pun) really taken off over the last few years. With large and small airline coming and going all the time there seems to be an infinite number of things you can collect and the amount of people collecting it keeps on growing. Just as railroad memorabilia has increased in value over the years, so has airline memorabilia now that collecting it has become more popular and many rare items can fetch a high price on sites like eBay and at collector shows. Since the beginning of passenger airline service in 1914 up until now airlines have produced, sold and given out many different items that could be classified as related memorabilia, usually with their company logo or name attached to it for information, sales, employment, marketing or operational purposes. They could be as small or meaningless as a swizzle stick, napkin, ticket or timetable or they might be as important or rare as a pilot’s wings, airline uniforms, art or even part of an actual plane! Memorabilia of CP Air comes in all different forms. There were many items produced for this airline for passengers and workers as well as items for advertising purposes. Often CP Air had promotional tie-ins with other divisions of Canadian Pacific such as CP Hotels or CP Rail. CP Air played a role as corporate sponsor to various events such as Expo 86 in Vancouver and the 1976 Olympics in Montreal which also would have produced many items worth collecting.
 

If you'd like to see or experience some real live memorabilia you might want to visit the Canadian Museum of Civilization in Gatineau Quebec Canada (near Ottawa). There they have an exhibit in Canada Hall called Pacific Gateway's Winged Empresses where it is designed as a full scale reproduction of a lounge in Vancouver International Airport in the late 1960s and uses some of the airport's actual fittings, such as two upholstered benches. Seated in the lounge, Museum visitors will be able to scan the Vancouver skyline, see virtual visitors traipse by, and admire period pieces that include a model of a DC-8 jet, a flight attendant's uniform and travel posters.

While CP Air primarily served Canada they had a very strong presence in Asia and the Pacific Rim and for that matter all over the world so the memorabilia available out there to collect is scattered throughout the globe.