Every family has a story. Just listen and you will find an amazing tale in everybody’s family history.
The Sawle Family Story is the story about two adopted girls and their adventurer father, a brave bush pilot flying in frozen northern skies.
This account is one chapter in The Sawle Family Story produced by Cory Bretz of Heirloom Films and Storybooks and commissioned by Sawle’s daughter, Linda Redmond.
On March 2, 1953, Captain Clarence North Sawle was co-pilot of the CPA De Havilland Comet Mark I passenger jet airliner on it’s delivery flight.
The Comet crashed on take off at Karachi, Pakistan.
The initial investigation labeled the crash “pilot error”.
It wasn’t until 6 years later in 1959 that De Havilland finally admitted the Mark I version of the Comet had several defects.
The challenge in producing the Sawle Family Story is that Clarence North Sawle had passed away five decades earlier and his wife was gone too. We had to build the story on the recollections of Sawle’s daughter who were age 10 when the crash happened and some old newspaper and radio stories.
Many families have the same challenge with documenting their family history. The people who actually know the details of the story are often gone. If we know the rough gyst of a story I advise my clients to make some guesses or even add some fiction if necessary. The point of story-telling is to teach and inspire. The audience needs certain information to make it interesting and understandable.
Make it up? Really? I always advise my clients that we are not writing a text book or legal deposition video that has to be “100% correct”, if there even is such a thing. The more important objective is to pass on a story that can inspire the next generation!