From Captain Reg Adkins' book, "I Flew For MMA":
Don Anderson and his co-pilot, John Pierce, with John Caesar and Bruce Melrose on the cameras, were a good example. As Don recalls (from November 1956), "We had been at Albany with DC-3 VH-AES for 13 days with no flying, due to cloudy weather. There was one day's flying to finish the Photographic Run and the forecast was such that if we could take off by 0900 the Run could be completed and we could all go home that day. On arrival at the airport, I found the batteries had not enough power to turn the props over, and the cloudy weather was due to return. The crew was thinking of another 14 days on the ground. I had heard of starting an aircraft engine with a rope on the tip of the prop and wound around the boss, the rope then being pulled by a Jeep. But I thought the idea a bit messy and fraught with trouble. So I thought I would get John Pierce to hang on to the tip of the prop, with John Caesar holding on to John Pierce's wrist, and Bruce Melrose holding on to John Caesar's wrist with both his hands, all pulling away from the prop - as they were keen to go home!
I was sitting in the cockpit, and decided to have a Dummy Run with the magnetos off. All went well until the "pull" started. They were pulling the port prop towards the port wing tip at an angle of about 20° forward of the plane of the blade rotation. The pull was executed with such strength and determination that John Pierce hurt his hand holding onto the prop tip and nearly dislocated both shoulder blades. John Caesar also nearly dislocated both his shoulders as Bruce pulled on his wrist with both hands. My crew were not keen to try this method again! So we tied a 20ft length of rope loosely around the tip of the prop, when the blade tip was at eight o'clock and with the magnetos off, the rope pulled the tip through 7, 6, and 5 o'clock to 4 o'clock where the loosely tied rope easily slipped down the blade tip. With the engines primed and prop on compression, all was set to go and I called `Contact' as I switched the mags on. They all pulled the rope hard, the prop swung, and as the rope came off the 4 o'clock position my crew all fell in a heap on the tarmac and to their delight, the engine started.