Editing Avro Canada (section)

===Avro Canada===
In 1944, an Advisory Committee on Aircraft Manufacture was established by the Canadian government, the Canadian Director of Aircraft Production wrote to Minister of Munitions and Supply [[C. D. Howe]] in 1944 to express the "utmost importance to Canada" of the establishment of a Canadian aircraft industry, and UK-based Avro also established in 1944 a company searching for post-war opportunities.<ref name="Whitcomb p. 34">Whitcomb 2008, p. 34.</ref> Bob Leckie of the [[Royal Canadian Air Force]] was a strong advocate over many years, for a wholly domestic "end-to-end" industry, that would design and build aircraft (and their engines) in Canada.  However, the [[Department of National Defence (Canada)|Department of National Defence]], according to Avro's Roy Dobson, gave "a cold reception" to doing any more than the fabrication and assembly of aircraft and engines under licence.<ref name="Whitcomb p. 34"/>

Howe, as Minister of Reconstruction and Minister of Munitions and Supply (later Reconstruction and Supply), brokered the deal with [[Hawker Siddeley]] to take over the Victory Aircraft plant in 1945 with Frederick T. Smye hired by HSG's Roy Dobson as its first employee. Smye, born in Hamilton, Ontario, had risen through the ranks of the government's departments overseeing wartime aircraft production, to Assistant General Manager of Federal Aircraft Limited, the Crown Corporation managing production of the Avro Anson at the National Steel Car/Victory Aircraft plant.<ref name="Whitcomb p. 34"/>

In 1945, the UK-based Hawker Siddeley purchased Victory Aircraft from the Canadian government, creating '''A.V. Roe Canada Ltd.''' as the wholly owned Canadian branch of its aircraft manufacturing subsidiary, UK-based [[Avro|A.V. Roe and Company]].<ref name="Frontiers"/> Avro Canada began operations in the former Victory plant. Avro Aircraft (Canada), their first (and, at the time, only) division, turned to the repair and servicing of a number of World War II era aircraft, including [[Hawker Sea Fury]] fighters, [[North American B-25 Mitchell]] and [[Avro Lancaster]] bombers.<ref name="Frontiers"/> From the outset, the company invested in research and development and embarked on an ambitious design program with a jet engine and a jet-powered fighter and airliner on the drawing boards.