Butler could never stop flying now, and his one aim was to get home, and to bring civil aviation with him.

History shows that he was perhaps a little before his time, but single-mindedness and determination roused latent enthusiasm in many South Australians and throughout the country he encouraged and inspired men to cling to their belief in the future of flying.

The rapid progress and enormous interest in aviation in this State owes much to the personality and genius of Harry Butler. He was a man of medium, rather stocky build, with a round, genial face that smiled easily and made you feel good just to look at him. All manner of people liked him, and were warmed by his zest for living and his enthusiasm for flying.

Rather slow and diffident on official occasions, he was another being when he got to the controls of a plane.

Aerobatics were his forte and the ultimate measure of his enormous skill. He himself was concerned with the serious business of flying, but he knew how far behind him in knowledge and appraisal lagged the average man in the street, and so for that man, Harry risked his life a thousand times as he dived, roller, flipped and hedgehopped in spectacular manoeuvres designed to capture the most stolid imagination, and make the most unresponsive man aware of aviation and its possibilities.