How does this sound: fly coast-to-coast in just 48 hours for only
$5200?
That was the pitch for the
first commercial, transcon air service in 1929 operated by TAT,
Transcontinental Air Transport, much later to become TWA. Founded by aviation pioneer Clement Melville
Keys, the firm worked with Charles Lindbergh to also secure lucrative mail
contracts. But these flights were a
first for passengers.
TAT was mocked as “take a
train” because their service combined rail and air service to make it from New
York to Los Angeles.
Passengers first boarded an
overnight train at 6:05 pm from NY’s Penn Station, “the Airways Special”. This first leg of the journey was to avoid
flying over the Allegheny Mountains, known to air mail pilots as “Hells
Stretch” due to the winds.
After an overnight journey
in their luxury Pullman cars the train arrived at a special rail station at
Port Columbus, Ohio’s airport, where they boarded a Ford
Tri-Motor. The small plane had a pilot, co-pilot,
steward (always a man) and seated eight or nine passengers.
The plan flew at 2,500 feet at about 100 mph….
straight through the clouds and rainstorms.
After two hours’ flight the
plane made its first (of many) refueling stops in Indianapolis. Sandwiches were
brought on board for the next hop, three hours away, in Kansas City. Then Wichita and finally Waynoka OK. There the passengers boarded a special TAT
bus and were taken to the train station for their second overnight rail journey. But first came dinner at a purpose-built Harvey House
restaurant.
By morning the train arrived
in Clovis NM where the passengers were again bused to the nearest airport,
Portair NM, where they had breakfast before boarding another plane to continue
on to Albuquerque,
Winslow and Kingman AZ. Over the western
mountain ranges the Tri-Motor sometimes climbed as high as 8000 feet.
As the cabin was not pressurized, this brought about a lot of
ear-popping and teeth chattering as a small onboard heater kept the cabin at no
better than about 60 degrees. To treat air sickness caused by the turbulence,
stewards passed out slices of lemon.
Finally, at about 6 pm Pacific time, more than 48 hours after leaving
New York, these aviation pioneers arrived in Los Angeles. The one-way fare was $352 (equal to $5200 in
today’s dollars), and that was for the cheapest Pullman train accommodation, a
lower berth.
Direct train service coast-to-coast in 1930 took three days, so the time savings by
air was hard to justify when TAT tickets cost 50% more than luxurious Pullmans
by rail.
In its first 18 months in operation, the TAT transcons lost $2.7 million
($41 million in 2019 dollars). It didn’t
help that, to maintain the prestige of flying TAT, each passenger was given a
solid gold fountain pen from Tiffany’s.
Then came the stock market crash of 1929. And on September 3, 1929, a literal crash, as
a TAT plane collided with a New Mexico mountain killing all eight on
board. This was the first fatal crash of
a commercial airplane, but just the first of three serious accidents in the
next five months for TAT.
Today you can fly non-stop
from New York to LA in six hours for less than $200 one-way. You’ll cruise in comfort in a pressurized
cabin at 35,000 feet, watch a movie and surf the web… and you might even get a
meal.
Posted with permission of Hearst CT Media
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