Peter Isaacson

Peter Stuart Isaacson, AM, DFC, AFC, DFM (31 July 1920 – 7 April 2017) was an Australian publisher and decorated military pilot. He was the owner of Peter Isaacson Publications, publisher of various trade journals and suburban newspapers including the Southern Cross and the Sunday Observer in Melbourne. During World War II, he served in the Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF) as a pilot with RAF Bomber Command and was awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross, the Air Force Cross and the Distinguished Flying Medal.

Isaacson grew up in Melbourne and started working for a newspaper when he was sixteen. He joined the RAAF in 1940. Following his stint in Bomber Command, he became well known in Australia for his tours in the Avro Lancaster Q-for-Queenie to promote the sale of war loans and, in particular, for flying his plane under the Sydney Harbour Bridge in 1943. He transferred to the RAAF Reserve after the war, retiring as a wing commander in 1969. From 1956 he served as a Trustee, Chairman, and finally Life Governor of the Victorian Shrine of Remembrance. In 1991 he was appointed a Member of the Order of Australia for his publishing and community work.

Early life Isaacson was born in London on 31 July 1920 to an Austrian mother, Caroline "Lynka" (née Jacobson) and an Australian father, Arnold Isaacson; his parents moved to Australia with him when he was six years old. Growing up in Melbourne, he was educated at Brighton Grammar School and started work at sixteen as a messenger boy on The Age, where his mother Caroline edited women's features. All of Isaacson's immediate family would eventually serve in World War II: his father, Arnold, a World War I veteran, joined the Volunteer Defence Corps, his mother became Public Relations Officer in the Australian Women's Army Service (AWAS), and his sister Joan became a photographer with the AWAS.

World War II On 8 December 1940, the nineteen-year-old Isaacson enlisted in the Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF). After completing his training in Australia and Canada, he was posted to the United Kingdom and joined No. 460 Squadron RAAF at RAAF Breighton, Yorkshire, as a sergeant pilot. Operating Vickers Wellington medium bombers, No. 460 Squadron had been raised under the Article XV provisions of the Empire Air Training Scheme and was one of a number of nominally Australian formations taking part in RAF Bomber Command's strategic air campaign against Germany. The squadron commenced operations in March 1942 and participated in 1,000-bomber raids against Cologne, Essen and Bremen in May and June. It converted to Avro Lancaster heavy bombers in October. The following month his Lancaster was damaged by a Junkers Ju 88 night fighter after a raid on Munich.

Commissioned as a pilot officer, Isaacson was subsequently posted to No. 156 Squadron RAF of the Pathfinder Force, based at RAF Warboys, Huntingdonshire.

Isaacson completed forty-five sorties with Bomber Command, when the likelihood of surviving an operational tour of thirty missions was never more than 50% and, at times, much less. Promoted to acting flight lieutenant, he was chosen in May 1943 to captain Lancaster Q-for-Queenie on a landmark flight from England to Australia across the Pacific Ocean, and then from Melbourne to New Zealand and back, non-stop in both directions. He was awarded the Air Force Cross on 27 August 1943 for this mission, the citation noting that it was "the first occasion on which an aircraft has flown to Australia by this route and the direct flights between Melbourne and New Zealand are the first of their kind". The Lancaster was brought to Australia so that it could serve as a template for local production of the type, but this never took place and it was instead used for exhibition flights to encourage purchase of war bonds. On 22 October 1943 Isaacson flew Q-for-Queenie under the Sydney Harbour Bridge, flouting a 1931 regulation that prohibited such activity; the Lancaster remains the largest aircraft to have been flown under the bridge. Isaacson gave his crew no warning of what he was about to do and when asked later why he did it, replied "Because it was there". It was, however, reported at the time that he undertook the stunt to support the war loan effort for which he and his crew were actively fundraising.

In December 1943, following his promotional tour with his crew in Q-for-Queenie, he settled down to instructional work at an operational training unit before undertaking a further tour in the Lancaster commencing in March 1944.

Post-war career

Isaacson stood as the Liberal candidate for Prahran in the November 1945 Victorian state election, but was defeated by Labor's Bill Quirk. His wartime commission was terminated on 21 February 1946 and he transferred to the RAAF Reserve. he established Peter Isaacson Publications the same year. Southern Cross was bought by APN News & Media in 1993 and Isaacson became APN's director, serving until 1998. The marriage produced two sons. He published As I Remember Them: Men and Women Who Shaped a Life, a collection of eulogies he had delivered for friends and colleagues, in 2012. Isaacson was a Life Governor of the Victorian Shrine of Remembrance, having previously served as a Trustee from 1956 to 2000, and Chairman from 1983 to 2000. He and his wife lived in the Melbourne suburb of Toorak.