![]() ![]() By the end of the war, the DC-4-with its big reliable Pratt & Whitneys, shiny streamlined skin, capacious cabin, long-range fuel tanks, and tricycle landing gear-had made thousands of chartered Atlantic crossings as C-54s, the U.S. What had been daring in 1939 when Pan Am opened regular North Atlantic passenger service with its Boeing 314 flying boats was old hat six years later. When Pan Am went bankrupt in 1991, Delta inherited its transatlantic routes (but apparently little obligation to celebrate past glories).įinally, the start of land-based commercial flights to Europe was not a bold leap forward in 1945. The airline that might have been throwing the party-American Airlines-sold its Atlantic division to Pan Am in 1950. More importantly, corporate identity left the event a brand orphan. Charter, and the atomic bomb for starters-was already crowded. The year 1945 was a historic one, and the 2020 calendar for 75th anniversaries-VE Day, VJ Day, the U.N. There are sound reasons why the commemoration of the inaugural flight is so…muted. Henceforth silvery airliners would lift off from concrete runways, carrying business travelers and tourists first by the thousands and then by the millions. From this humble beginning of 12 passengers, transatlantic passenger traffic increased dramatically, with 312,000 passengers crossing by air in 1950. That yawn signaled the start of airborne travel for the masses. Yet that first yawn marked the end of the era of the flying boat, the glamorous “Clippers”-the Boeing 314 and the Sikorsky VS-44-that lofted a tiny number of the rich and important across the seas. ![]() It was just as commonplace as that.”Ī yawn on arrival is the standard salute of most passengers who cross the ocean in today’s landplanes. ![]() 24-History will never believe it! After completing the first commercial flight of a landplane from North America to Europe late this afternoon, the American Airlines flagship ‘London’ came out of the sky over this field, landed gently, came to a stop and a passenger yawned. His front-page story began: “HURN AIRFIELD, ENGLAND, Oct. Then it was on to refueling stops in Gander, Newfoundland and Shannon in the Republic of Ireland before the final hop to Hurn, the airfield at Bournemouth.įor Barry, it was all too much-or maybe too little. The first stop was Bedford Army Air Field in Boston to pick up Governor Tobin, along with radio personality and Boston Daily Globe columnist John Barry. So let us raise a glass to that late Tuesday afternoon long ago when a DC-4 named Flagship London and operated by a newly acquired American Airlines subsidiary, American Export Airlines (AMEX), went “wheels up” from LaGuardia Airport. (London’s Heathrow didn’t open to transatlantic flights until May 1946.) Everyone who has ever flown the Atlantic in economy class should have been invited to a big 75th anniversary party-except there was no party. ![]() Stamp collectors might have considered Octoa day to remember, but 75 years later few recall the first scheduled transatlantic service via “land plane” from New York to London-or at least to Bournemouth, a seaside town 100 miles from the British capital. The Second Assistant Postmaster was flying to London for the day to oversee the postmarking of the thousands of first-flight covers packed into the DC-4’s hold, each envelope declaring that it had been carried on the “First Commercial Land Plane Flight Overseas.” And then it was straight home next day on the return flight, carrying a second set of covers with British stamps. But what was a Second Assistant Postmaster doing in this crowd? Then the penny dropped-stamp collectors. Spencer, including the stewardess, Miss Dorothy Bohannon. There was also a crew of seven under Captain Charles C. The Second Assistant was one of 12 passengers on a VIP flight filled with wire-service correspondents, a radio reporter, airline top brass, and the governor of Massachusetts, the Honorable Maurice J. Sullivan, while the Boston Daily Globe had it as “Gael Sullivan.” Perhaps Sullivan had to shout the spelling of his name to reporters to be heard over the drone of the Douglas DC-4’s big radial engines as the unpressurized airplane cruised eastbound at 8,000 feet over the North Atlantic. The New York Times said his name was Gail E. At first I couldn’t figure out what a Second Assistant Postmaster General was doing on a transatlantic press junket to London in late 1945. ![]()
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