Varig threw down the big bucks and bought themselves 707’s in the early 1960’s.  Here’s one of their first on a test hop over Eastern Washington.

United Airlines never made much money from their Boeing 377s.  I’ll let my dad (UAL pilot 1945-81) give his verdict: “The 377 was one expensive mother to operate.”  The beast seen here is N31225, “Mainliner Hawaii.”

 

Boeing’s first three 314’s bob along the shores of Lake Washington in 1939.  In the next photo, taken the same year, the fourth 314 is seen tied alongside log rafts on the Duwamish River next to Boeing’s plant in Seattle.

The way everyone is looking at the stewardess, you’d think they were told to beware of her habit of  smashing food trays over the heads of unsuspecting passengers.   Anyhoo, an original promotional poster for Western Airlines and their new wonder plane, the Lockheed L-188 Electra. 

On August 12th, 1962, UAL flight 861 had the misfortune of mistaking Portland International for the more provincial airport at Troutdale, just up the Columbia River.  Committed to his approach, the pilot landed. Getting in was one thing; getting out was another. Troutdale’s runway was only about 4,600 feet in length, thus requiring the mishap airliner to lose some weight to ensure a safe takeoff. The DC-8 was stripped of everything, the flight engineer crunched the numbers, and the crew departed without too much trouble.

This photo is from a Christmas card sent to my dad from a fellow UAL captain – the pilot of the DC-8.  If he could make a card out of it, he must have had a sense of humor.  Interestingly, the pilot mentions they toyed with using a JATO-type device to get the plane out of Troutdale. 

On the right, workmen in coveralls, and a gent sporting a top coat and homburg hat, are hoisting the tail of another Detroiter.

 

Couldn’t find much on Pathfinder Aerial Transportation, but it was owned by a former Air Service pilot, Valdo H. Brazil.  Maybe that’s him holding aloft the tail of one of his Curtiss JN-4’s.

Quite a bit going on with this Fokker F.Vll: looks like new motors are being hung, and the skin is sliced open for additional repairs.

Snazzy airplane awaits its snazzy-dressed passengers.

…but ‘whisper’ and ‘727’ are two words rarely used in the same sentence, or for that matter, the same month. But hey, it’s a great plane, and he’s having no trouble catching up with the Super Constellation photo bird. (No whisperer there either).