Pan Am TV Show in the Works

Ha! I flew Pan Am when I was 13 (1985?) returning from Europe and I don’t remember it being anything special, aside from the fact that I was on a very long plane ride from Europe which itself is pretty exciting when you are 13. That said, back in the days of regulated or just barely deregulated air fares I do recall a few perks, again from a kid’s perspective. For one thing, the kid’s meals on United were super cool and came inside a cigar box, loaded with all kinds of cool activities, wing pin, etc. Also, you could usually get a free deck of cards.

As another example of how different things were, I once took a flight on Continental maybe the year before and there was a whole cabin in COACH class that was cleared out to make room for a walk-up bar, with its own unassigned seating for visitors to the bar. Not so much these days.

Delta may be cringing at this if they tell how Delta refused to buy PanAm outright but instead bought only the routes and therefore nullified all Pan Am employees’ pensions. Those wonderful PanAm employees have a miserable retirement thanks to Delta. Shame.

I too remember the old CO jumbos that had a bar area with sofas for coach to Hawaii!

The last Pan Am flight I took (1981) was on the China Clipper a 747 SP designed for long flights. I was on my way to Sinapore for business and I flew from JFK to SFO then boarded the Clipper for Hong Kong. It took 18 hours, and I was in First Class. The service was impeccable, the food was 4 star, the environment was plush; and the time flew by. I miss that in air travel. I miss the respect we as passengers had for that privilage. Yes, I used to dress up for air travel, and still do to some extent. I will not wear jeans, shorts, or tee shirts.

Now, having said all that: My return trip from Singapore was on Singapore Air. First Class. As much as I was impressed with the Pan Am First Class service, the SA trip far exceeded my Pan Am experience.

I went to work as a pilot for Pan Am in 1966, where I was based in SFO flying the Pacific and around the world flights. Then in 1981 I transferred to NYC (commuted from SFO) to fly the Airbus A310 on the Atlantic routes. I was among the first group of pilots to fly the Atlantic in a 2-engine jet. Being accustomed to having 4 engines on the wings, it was a bit uncomfortable with only 2 engines out there for awhile.

When Delta bought the Atlantic routes in about 1991 they needed a turnkey system because they didn’t have any pilots qualified on the A310. So most all of us who were on the A310 went with Delta in that route purchase. I retired with a medical issue one year after going with Delta.

If the Pan Am show airs, I hope they will show some of the humanitarian deeds that Pan Am, it’s flight crews and employees performed over the years. Unfortunately, the Real Pan Am would probably be boring for today’s audience, so I suppose it’s going to be a sex type soap.

Sometime in the 1970′s there was an earthquake in Guatamala. I volunteered along with the rest of the crew to fly for free to deliver supplies from San Francisco to Guatamala. Pan Am donated the airplane and the supplies.

From 1966 until the end of the Vietnam war I flew many flights out of Saigon, Danang, and Cam Ranh Bay to take our GI’s to places like Hong Kong, Manila, Sydney, and Bangkok for R&R. Of course we got paid, but we also got shot at going into the Vietnamese airports. On occasion we would find a small arms bullet home in the bottom of the aircraft. Fortunately, no aircraft was ever seriously damaged by the small arms fire.

There was an esprit de corp attitude among all the Pan Am employees. Everyone took pride in working for what we felt was the greatest airline in the world. It was sad through the years to see Pan Am getting broken up piece by piece starting with the selling of Pan Am’s profitable international hotel chain. Among the hotels we owned was the famous Mark Hopkins Hotel in San Francisco.

One of the highlights of my career was meeting Charles Lindbergh. He served on the Pan Am Board of Directors for many years; and a few years before his death we had the pleasure of having him on board on our flight from Fairbanks to Tokyo. He came to the cockpit and talked to us for about 30 minutes telling us he was on his way to Jakarta to work on some route structures. He helped pioneer many of Pan Am’s international routes.