Airline travel then and now

Airline travel in the early 1960s was still fairly carefree: If you had a ticket, you could board a plane. The escalation of hijackings in the 1970s made routine passenger screenings the new norm, evolving into today's time-consuming luggage and body scans. The early industry focused on passenger comfort; today passenger safety and flight security are the priorities.

Sources: Terrence Kelly, St. Louis University's Center for Aviation Research; Jane's All the World's Aircraft, 1957-58 and 1981-82. Graphics reporting and interactivity by Tia Lai. Illustrations by Doug Stevens.

Comments (9)

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Oscar Forell at 12:43 PM October 04, 2011

If there are some security on flights today, did not happen by information from the CIA or FBI or concerns of governments, but only after lots of tragedy ...
If we travel with jets of 50/60 years and below the MACH 2 - after 20 years traveling with the Concorde ... is only because greedy companies... who want to sell more tickets ...
So far, only the failures were improved, but in fact, no changes occurred in aviation after the engine copied from the Nazis ... if you think serious about it ... What outrage.

mindnumbing at 2:43 AM July 12, 2011

In the day, "stewardii" were largely "waitresses". But gender stereotyping and discrimination is not all that has been corrected. Today, "flight attendants" are authority figures whose roles do not include efforts to comfort or appease passengers. I see the day approaching quickly when all refreshments and services will be removed from coach, and the role of the flight attendant will be solely enforcement of rules. Needless to say, I am relearning the pleasures of auto travel. Not only is it actually much more practical for many trips, but actually faster and cheaper given the additional time margins now required, limits on what can be carried, and the parking at large airports. Nobody "corrects" your every step, you can eat, drink, and (gag) smoke when you want. And your property doesn't have to fit in the space reserved for your feet. You can use your cell phone. You never have to wait for anything. You can stop and walk around if you want. I can easily handle two days of those priveleges over a the loss of almost an entire day to a two mile hike, getting groped, insulted and pushed around by a dumb, arrogant federal employee, loosing my property because the line must move fast, being loaded and unloaded like cattle (again, losing things), and all the other things that make me much more exhausted by the time I get there.

mindnumbing at 2:23 AM July 12, 2011

"Riff-Raff was restricted from being on-board, due to regulations and the high cost of tickets." I guess it's all in what riff-raff means - a term intended to replace what we would not otherwise say! If it means poor people with no social protocol, then ticket price does that. People still use it for that purpose, especially in things like housing. Safe and quiet communities are more expensive than the property demands -- they are intentionally exclusive. But how, pray tell, were riff-raff kept off airplanes by "regulation"? I guess people could be snagged and removed early in the process with things like not dressing according to the code (and there was a code then). Clothing was a major source of information about a person, and determined how they were treated. Many social problems started with the improvements in clothing like permanent press, and style changes which accompanied them. Today, you can't tell who is who by how they are dressed. Back then you could. In 1950 or even 1960, a person who wanted to look like a professional not only had to afford good clothing, but the maintenance of it (expensive and skill-demanding ironing, pressing, cleaning, universal requirements for custom alterations, and many details gone today). You simply could not dress the part without the means. Today you can, quite easily, although it isn't much required to get in anywhere.

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