A Brief History Of Flight Attendants

AOL Travel News:

From sexy stewardesses to former NYPD officers, AOL Travel charts how cabin crews have changed over the decades.

It's a stunning evolution for a profession that was once considered glamorous and sexy. The job has been a window on American attitudes towards women ever since 1930, when Ellen Church became the first "stewardess" on Boeing Air Transit (which later became United Airlines). Legislation finally forced airlines to hire men as flight attendants in significant numbers in the 1990s, and deregulation, economic contraction and, above all, 9/11 have changed the face of the profession.

Read the whole story: AOL Travel News

Comments

[Chaling]

03:47 PM on 08/24/2010

and they make peanuts for income, seems I remember the norm now, from reading the blog of Queen of The Sky, the blogger fired for 'inappropriate' pics in the cabin, in uniform, is around low $20s-K. who can survive on that?

[VapeGirl]

07:39 AM on 08/24/2010

Flying, any more, sucks for both passengers and crew. Planes are to cramped.

[whyus]

02:40 AM on 08/24/2010

Once, long ago on a distant planet, you had to be about 5'7", slim, have 20/20 vision, be pretty and have a pleasant personality to be an airline stewardess. In other words, you had to be Audrey Hepburn or you didn't get the job.

[sheaintsayin]

01:21 AM on 08/24/2010

PSA: sunny orange and pink mini dresses for uniforms, matching patent leather go-go boots, cute caps; $19 fares between San Francisco and Los Angeles, smoking sections, $2 alcohol, choice of hot meals,waving a loved pone off from the gate, hella handsome pilots - those were the days!

Flying now is a pita, and I'd rather train it or drive.

[JScott]

04:15 AM on 08/25/2010

And remember 'we move our tails for you' back in the 1st generation of Continental Airlines.
And the animated commercial of the bird reclining on the tail of the plane in flight
'Western Airlines the only way to fly'.

[sheaintsayin]

04:34 AM on 08/25/2010

Oh, yes; those slogans blatantly stoked the notions of glamour and the idea of the mile high club, for sure!

[HowietheScreamer]

04:12 PM on 08/26/2010

That must have been in the 60s. Now, a quick check says that same flight is 98 bucks.

Deregulation brought ticket prices way down, so much so that flying is now available to the masses. Airlines wanted deregulation, but weren't prepared to deal with the after effects. The result has been detestation for the airlines, but great for the consumer.

People expect far too much for how little they pay for an airline ticket. You want free meals, booze, etc... fine buy a 1st class or Business class ticket. Half the problem is people expecting to be treated like kings and queens, but paying a pittance for the fare. Don't work that way. The other half of the problem was that airlines weren't prepared for deregulation, and the ensuing competition. Legacy airlines have fixed costs that are far out of whack with what they can bring in. Hence the ch 11 and 7 bankruptcies. Cost cuts aren't fun, and yea service has declined from what it was under a regulated industry, but hey... if you want better service, pay for it. That is the whole point of deregulation.

[learninglife]

11:11 PM on 08/23/2010

Guess I've been lucky - most flights I've taken over the years have been drama-free - though on occasion when there have been delays, I've seen flight attendants take the brunt of passenger anger.

It could be because I was a kid at the time, but I remember flying on airlines such as Pan Am in the 60s and it did indeed seem glamorous. What's more, my brothers and I wore jackets and ties, and most other passengers seemed to dress for the occasion of travel.

I don't remember if people were any more rude in the past or simply more repressed - but travelling was an adventure, not an ordeal as it appears to be today.

Considering the conditions they have to put up with, I find most flight attendants to be professional and friendly.

[HowietheScreamer]

04:14 PM on 08/26/2010

People dressed up because flying was the bastion of the privileged class. Most average people never flew anywhere. After deregulation, that all changed. Competition drove prices down to where anyone could fly.

Heck, last week I flew from Seattle to Honolulu for 150 bucks. How insane is that? Deregulation has been fan-friggen-tastic for the consumer, but bugger all bad for the airlines (well at least the legacy carriers).

[Frog in a pot]

10:12 PM on 08/23/2010

It used to be a well paying job with good union benefits.Now a server at TGIF makes more.

[Absolon]

08:36 PM on 08/23/2010

My how times have changed. It used to be fun to fly. Now the flight attendants are fat and fifty-five and in a pissy mood. Can't blame them. They've been sold out by their employers and the general public they have to put up with are often reprehensible.