By any measure, Juan Terry Trippe was a remarkable business leader - a visionary, devious, shrewd, deeply flawed, and ultimately inscrutable genius. Franklin D. Roosevelt, a Harvard man, once called him "the most fascinating Yale gangster I ever met." Trippe built Pan American Airways from a single scrap of paper - a license to fly airmail from Key West to Havana - into the world's largest airline. In the process, he all but single-handedly shaped the world of air travel. If Juan Trippe had never existed, it's safe to say that the world would look very different from the way it does today. Here's his extraordinary story.

In 1966, Pan American Airways reached the zenith of its wealth & influence. Its pilots were lords of the sky; Skygods. Under aviation pioneer Juan Trippe's autocratic control, Pan Am bought jet airliners before its competitors & made record profits. It was the first U.S. airline to order the supersonic transport; it accepted reservations for the first service to the Moon. Then Pan American Airways fell to earth. In Skygods, Robert Gandt, a Pan Am pilot for 26 years, gives an inside account of the great airline's unprecedented demise. He interviewed hundreds of former Pan Am airmen & executives. He reveals how Pan Am's captains, in Navy-style uniforms, once commanded their ships like petty tyrants. They were the best & brightest in airline industry, but there were disturbing stories of captains who allowed stewardesses to land their aircraft, flew them at the wrong altitude & in the wrong direction & who tragically disappeared, often without a trace. All was not well either in the Pan Am Building, the massive landmark in New York where a succession of impulsive & short-sighted CEOs combined to preside over the demise of a great airline. Pan An bought a domestic airline it did not need; bought aircraft it did not need & operated half-empty planes on low-density routes. It sold the entire Pacific network for a bargain price & sold precious assets to meet its payrolls. And then came the Lockerbie tragedy. This is a fascinating account of what can go wrong with a pillar of strength of the U.S. industry, when its leaders lose their sense of direction & when their star employees-the Skygods-discover that they are mere mortals.

"A lively, unexpected portrait of the jet-age stewardesses serving on iconic Pan Am airways between 1966 and 1975"--

OA tribute to the legacy of one of the world's great airlines and the men and women who for six decades were the soul of the company. Baldwin and Kriendler have created a compelling book which captures much of the joy, adventure and spirit which was Pan Am.ONEdward S. Trippe, Chairman, Pan Am Historical Foundation.

Though we routinely take to the air, for many of us flying remains a mystery. Few of us understand the how and why of jetting from New York to London in six hours. How does a plane stay in the air? Can turbulence bring it down? What is windshear? How good are the security checks? Patrick Smith, an airline pilot and author of Salon.com's popular column, "Ask the Pilot," unravels the secrets and tells you all there is to know about the strange and fascinating world of commercial flight. He offers: A nuts and bolts explanation of how planes fly Insights into safety and security Straight talk about turbulence, air traffic control, windshear, and crashes The history, color, and controversy of the world's airlines The awe and oddity of being a pilot The poetry and drama of airplanes, airports, and traveling abroad In a series of frank, often funny explanations and essays, Smith speaks eloquently to our fears and curiosities, incorporating anecdotes, memoir, and a life's passion for flight. He tackles our toughest concerns, debunks conspiracy theories and myths, and in a rarely heard voice dares to return a dash of romance and glamour to air travel.

After Pan American's First commercial flight, from Key West to Havana, in 1927, airline visionary and company founder Juan Trippe teamed up with heroic aviator Charles Lindbergh to pioneer routes into the Caribbean and South America. Enlisting early aircraft builders Sikorsky, Martin, and Boeing, Pan Am developed planes that finally conquered the vast Pacific and Atlantic oceans, breaking down the boundaries that separated peoples and cultures. During its first 40 years the company was responsible for virtually every innovation in commercial aviation, from safety and performance features in its aircraft to jet travel at affordable fares. Along the way, Pan Am attracted endorsements from celebrities, the mistrust of Presidents and the envy of competitors. "iPan Am: An Aviation Legend" recounts the great friendship between Trippe and Lindberg, the secret wartime mission Franklin Roosevelt made aboard a Pan Am Clipper, and the courageous acts of pilots such as Ed Musick, who bravely flew across Pacific Ocean in 1935. With its logo on everything from tiny single-engine planes to the magnificent 747, Pan-American changed the way Americans saw the world and the way the world viewed America. Although Pan American World Airways ceased flying in 1991, its photographic history stirs the imagination of the air traveler just as images of the Orient Express, the Titanic and the Concorde intrigue railroad, ocean-liner and aviation buffs. With more than 250 illustrations and vivid text, author Barnaby Conrad III honors not only Pan American's golden era of the 30s and 40s, but also depicts its iconic style of the 50s and 60s jet age in an unforgettable manner. Ladies and gentlemen, please fasten your seat belts as this book takes you aboard the greatest airline of the 20th century. Filled with stunning photographs and artifacts, this book evokes the golden age of air travel, when boarding a Pan Am Clipper bound for Pago Pago or Macao meant an adventurous journey in unprecedented style. "Someday," wrote Claire Booth Luce in 1941, "a clipper flight will be remembered as the most romantic voyage in history."

An account of Pan Ams Nisei stewardess program (1955&–1972), through which the airline hired Japanese American (and later other Asian and Asian American) stewardesses, ostensibly for their Asian-language skills.