Pearson International Airport's History

Toronto's main airport opened in 1939 on farmland near the community of Malton, northwest of the city, at a site chosen partly for its flat, open land well suited to runway construction and its proximity to de Havilland Canada's aircraft manufacturing operations next door. Known simply as Malton Airport for its first decades, it grew steadily through the postwar boom in air travel, adding terminals and runways as passenger volumes climbed year after year.

A name change in 1984

The airport was renamed Toronto Pearson International Airport in 1984, honouring Lester B. Pearson, the former Canadian prime minister who had won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1957 for his role resolving the Suez Crisis before later serving as prime minister from 1963 to 1968. By the time of the renaming, the airport had already grown into the busiest in Canada, and it has continued to expand in the decades since, adding additional terminals to handle a passenger volume that dwarfs its humble 1939 farmland origins.

Sources

• Greater Toronto Airports Authority — Pearson history
• Wikipedia — Toronto Pearson International Airport

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