Bert Hinkler’s voice celebrated on global heritage day

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Bert Hinkler voice: World Day for Audiovisual Heritage
Bert Hinkler's 1928 voice recording has been celebrated as part of World Day for Audiovisual Heritage.

The State Library of Queensland featured a recording by Bundaberg pioneer aviator Bert Hinkler as part of World Day for Audiovisual Heritage.

Bert made the recording in March 1928, starting with: “I want to tell you a few things about flying”.

In a blog post on the library website, Jacinta Sutton writes that Bert's voice was the “natural choice” to reflect the day's theme of “Engage with the Past through Sound and Image”.

“I venture to say in 20 years’ time the aeroplane may be as familiar a figure in our scheme of things, as a motor car is today,” Bert says in the recording.

He opines that light aircraft will usher in a new era of personal transportation in Australia.

He says that all one needs to fly “is an aeroplane, level clearings, a few hundred yards square of landing grounds and a mechanical knowledge no greater than that possessed by the average common sense motorist”.

Ms Sutton notes that Bert speaks from a position of confidence, of someone whose success manifested from their determination and courage.

His contagious sense of adventure is enough to inspire a fossick into acquiring a personal pilot’s licence, and adding it to the bucket list.

“To sit in a snug little cockpit, to see the world rolling away below, to hear the sweet even note of the engine… well, to me, flying… this is the salt of life,” Bert said.

Captured on a 78 speed record, copied to cassette by John Simpson of Record Market, Queen Street in 1993, and now digitised and available to listen online, State Library has conserved Bert Hinkler's voice this slice of Queensland history.

World Day for Audiovisual Heritage was on Sunday, 27 October.