A close friend of mine who grew up in Owen Sound, Ontario (a smallish town about 2 1/2 hours northwest of Toronto), has occasionally recounted the many times she was dragged as a schoolkid to the Billy Bishop museum there. (Bishop, as you probably already know, was Canada’s most decorated  flying ace during WWI.) The remembered tedium of those visits — it not being the most exciting repeat destination for a second-grader, whatever else its merits — is such that she involuntarily rolls her eyes and sighs heavily whenever she hears the man’s name.

Fate may be looking to aggravate her more, because not only have Eric Petersen and John Gray remounted their classic one-man play Billy Bishop Goes to War, but the Toronto Port Authority has announced plans to rename the ever-contentious Toronto Island Airport the Billy Bishop Toronto City Airport.

Other than my friend’s discomfort, there is a larger problem with the plan: there already is an airport named after him: the Billy Bishop Regional Airport outside of Owen Sound.

Bishop’s son Arthur approves of the change, according to The Globe and Mail, but some folks up in the ‘Sound are not so pleased. The Owen Sound Sun-Times dubs the Toronto airport a “name-napper” and quotes the manager of Bishop airport 1.0 as saying the idea “is so silly, I can’t even believe it.” Bill Murdoch, the area’s MPP wonders, “Do they not have anybody in Toronto they might be able to name it after?” The mayor of Owen Sound and others have expressed concerns that having two airports with similar names will cause confusion among pilots — more than a bit of a red herring given that pilots use call letters to identify airports, not the names.

The question about there being no one else to name it after is a good one, though. Here’s my theory: someone on the Port Authority board went to see the play, had a great time, and came away thinking, “Gosh, something should be done to honour that wonderful man’s memory…”

If there’s any truth to that, we should at least be glad the board member in question didn’t go see We Will Rock You, or those of us who live in Toronto would currently being debating the merits of The Freddy Mercury Airport.

(Actually, I kind of like that…)

Here’s some other suggestions for the Toronto Island airport immortalization: Joseph Bouchette, who first surveyed Toronto’s harbour; J.P. Rademuller, the island lighthouse keeper who died mysteriously (and may still haunt the lighthouse); and Babe Ruth, who hit his first professional home run on the island’s old baseball park.

Oh, and Geddy Lee, because, um, his voice soars higher than any plane.

(Though if it was Geddy, this might cause some pilot confusion.)