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TWA Constellation, Somewhere, USA, 1956
A lady with a left armful, including a fancy fur coat, raises a camera as passengers board the fastest most luxurious passenger plane flying the friendly skies.
Until the first jet propelled passenger plane departed from San Francisco International Airport in March of 1959 the Constellation was the standard of the commercial airline industry. With its instantly recognizable banana-like fuselage and triple-tails it was also the most distinctive. It flew at twenty thousand feet and carried fifty passengers.
Just after Lockeed began manufacturing the Constellation in Burbank, California in 1944 it became the first commercial airliner to fly coast-to-coast non-stop. Howard Hughes made the historic flight in a record six hours and fifty-seven minutes. A year later the Connie, as it was affectionately known, began service for TWA. In 1955 the bigger faster Super-Constellation was the first plane to fly non-stop from California to Europe. In 1958, after 856 Constellations were built, production was discontinued to make way for the jet-age. The last TWA passenger flight was in March of 1967.
Today about fifty Constellations exist around the world in various states of disrepair. Only three are believed to be in flying condition. Only one of those three has the original TWA paint scheme that you see here in this slide. And it is beside that very plane, on display in a hangar at the Airline Museum in Kansas City, Missouri, that I will have a retro slide show and host a vintage TWA stewardess fashion show next Saturday night, October 4th. Tickets and Info
Heres to the Constellation, vintage TWA Stewardess uniforms and YOU!
Posted Saturday, September 27th, 2008 under Slide of the Week.
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Ah, these were the planes my dad traveled for business in the 1950’s! It did seem that there must have been a photographer hanging out on the tarmac in those early days of air traveling, as my dad also has some photos (with him lining up to go aboard) such as these.
This could be a photo from the “thrown-out, lost, or simply… ABANDONED bunch of intimate family memorabilia” that I saw THE HOME MOVIES TAKEN OF “THAT FLIGHT” & VACATION.
It was presented at a local “National Home Movies Day” event here in Las Vegas. A librarian from nearby Boulder City had bought the “Las Vegas related” home movie on E-Bay or someplace for just A FEW BUCKS.
The audience was immediately enamored of “1950’s Nuclear Family Vacation” (as it was christened after being transfered to DVD).
We gave each member of the “Unknown Family” a cute 50’s sounding name and then were spellbound by what was apparently a trip from back east out to California with a side trip to Classic Las Vegas.
The beautiful cactus garden in front of the then very modern looking, glass-lobbied Desert Inn (complete with builder Wilber Clark’s moniker on a sign) WAS A SURPRISE EVEN TO AN OLD-TIMER LIKE ME!
At the end of the movie we imagined a “Twilight Zone” like scenario of the young daughter (now an old woman), standing up in the theater and calling out, “Where did you get OUR FAMILY’S… HOME MOVIES!”.
As usual, I fell in love with the cute full of personality that defied the silent nature of the film, daughter & sister to the young man that probably died fighting in the soon to begin… Viet Nam war.”
On another level. I worked for Lockheed and was charged with de-commissioning the old Burbank Factory & Hangars (were the Constellations were built). The “Hidden History” I found in the house that Kelly built (Johnson: father of the FLYING “BANANNA” FUSELAGE Conny, the P-38 Lightning, & the “Darth Vader Airlines”, SR-71, 2,000 MPH, “Blackbird” spyship).
Well. Said “Hidden History” ranged from Amelia Earhart to Howard Hughes.
It was like walking into Irwin Allen’s “Time Tunnel”… for a trip back to a VERY DIFFERENT AMERICA.
What a coincidence that you would have a picture of the Constellation. When I saw the announcement from your show, at first I thought you were coming out with another book. That looks like a fun show. Today, my wife, baby boy, and I went to National Air Force Museum in Dayton, Ohio. You can visit their webpage at http://www.nationalafmuseum.af.mil. They have a section devoted to Bob Hope’s entertaining the troops as well as the Presidential Hanger with the planes that Eisenhower, Nixon, and Roosevelt flew in. Hope you get a lot of people at your next show.
Ah Yes…the beautiful Connie.
I saw the first flight in 1943 at it flew right over our grammar school in North Hollywood on climb out from Lockheed Air Terminal. In junior high, I used to build little hand carved models of it. I’ve flown back and forth across America in them, stopping for gas in Kansas City. Flew to Stuttgart across the Atlantic on Lufthansa where our first class seats could be made into curtain enclosed night sleepers. I even have the autograph of the designer, famed Kelly Johnson.
Bob
Your “E” ticket please!.
Darius Long
Saw you in KC last Sat. and certainly enjoyed the presentation. Had experienced most of the places you’ve been. We take too much for granted, I guess.
A great evening!
I am very sorry i missed your show. My mother was a stwardess for TWA out of Kansas City in 1956-1958. Her career ended when she got married. Her name was Roberta Hamilton and at the time she lived in California. We have some pictures, and a friend made her wings into a bracelet shortly after she left TWA. It is very possible she is on this plane in your picture. I would love to have copies of any other pictures you may have, and would be willing to share the 3 or 4 that we have. Keep up the good work!
Great pic! I rode in a “Connie” in 1991. In Alaska, of all places. I was getting off of a commercial fishing boat in the Pribilof Islands, went to the airport and one these was waiting for us sporting the Aleutian Airlines colors! What a relic! I recognized it immediately, and couldn’t believe it was still flying. It was unchanged inside, but a little worse for wear. Saint Paul Island to Anchorage non stop!