Western Airlines

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Western Airlines was a large airline based in California, with operations throughout the Western United States, and hubs at Los Angeles International Airport and Salt Lake City International Airport. Western Airlines used the IATA code WA.

Contents 1 History 1.1 Western Air Express 1.2 Transcontinental & Western Airlines 1.3 General Airlines 1.4 Western Airlines 1.5 Delta Air Lines 2 Successors 3 Advertising 4 External links

[edit] History

[edit] Western Air Express

In 1925, the United States Postal Service began to give airlines contracts to carry air mail all around the country. The company first incorporated in 1925 as Western Air Express by Harris Hanshue. It applied for, and was awarded, the 650-mile long Contract Air Mail Route #4 (CAM-4) from Salt Lake City, Utah to Los Angeles. In April of 1926, Western's first flight took place with a Douglas M-2 airplane. It began offering passenger services a month later.

[edit] Transcontinental & Western Airlines

The company reincorporated in 1928 as Western Air Express Corp. Then, in 1930, it added two Fokker F.32 aircraft and merged with Transcontinental Air Transport to form TWA.

[edit] General Airlines

Western Air Transport soon broke off from TWA's structure, and in 1934, changed its name to General Airlines.

[edit] Western Airlines

In 1941 General changed its name back to Western Airlines after Howard Hughes renamed his TWA to Trans World Airlines.

After World War II, Western expanded into a large regional airline, introducing service on the Lockheed Constellation, Douglas DC-6, and Lockheed Electra. It merged in 1967 with Pacific Northern Airlines and in the late 60s pushed for an all-jet fleet, adding Boeing 707s, 727s and 737s to its fleet of Boeing 720s. In 1973 it added McDonnell Douglas DC-10s.

On October 31, 1979, Western Flight 2605 crashed while landing at Benito Juarez International Airport in Mexico City. The crew of the DC-10 had landed on the wrong runway and impacted with construction vehicles.

At its peak in the 1970s and 1980s, Western Airlines flew to many cities across the American Southwest and to various spots in Mexico and Canada, while keeping a large intra-state route structure in its home state of California. It began flights from Anchorage and Denver to London Gatwick Airport in 1981. As it extended its eastern network to such airports as Washington-Dulles and Boston-Logan, it became a prominent sponsor of the Bob Barker television show The Price is Right, to try to make customers from the East more aware of their presence.

[edit] Delta Air Lines

In the early 1980s, Air Florida tried several times to buy Western Airlines, but it was able to purchase only 16 percent of the airline's stock. Finally, on September 9, 1986 Western Airlines was bought by Delta Air Lines, and it merged fully into that airline on April 1, 1987.

[edit] Successors

In 2005, a new start-up airline began business out of Bellingham International Airport in Bellingham, Washington, using the Western Airlines name. The airline is currently working through the process of gaining FAA approval as a commercial airline. In November 2006, the new Western Airlines announced regular service would begin January 18, 2007. The first flight will be from Bellingham International Airport, and fly non-stop to Los Angeles/Ontario using a leased 737. Other planned routes, also starting January 2007, include service to San Diego, Pheonix, and Reno; all originating from Bellingham, WA. Additional routes, and future aircraft acquisitions are in the works. The similarity of the new and old Western Airlines stops at the name, and should in no way be considered a successor.

[edit] Advertising

Western can also be noted for contributing to popular culture with its 1960s advertising slogan, "It's the oooooonly way to fly!" Spoken by the Wally Bird, an animated bird hitching a ride aboard the fuselage of a Western airliner, the phrase soon found its way into animated cartoons by Warner Bros. and Hanna-Barbera. Another famous advertising campaign by the airline centered on Star Trek icons William Shatner and Leonard Nimoy.

During the 1970's, they promoted themselves as "the champagne airline" because champagne was offered to every adult passenger.

[edit] External links

• Historical timetables and route maps
• Historical timetable covers
• History of Western Airlines and the planes it operated