ON THE JOB
Longest serving airport worker pulls his weight
Cars move along the curb outside Terminal 2 as if in a choreographed ballet, each gliding to a stop in front of the skycap stand. Doors and trunk lids swing open in rhythm, setting up a pas de deux between drivers and their passengers.
With strangers and Uber drivers, polite thank yous are exchanged. With loved ones, embraces and emotional goodbyes are sometimes punctuated with blinked-away tears.
Car doors slam again and the vehicles slowly roll away, closing the curtain on the first act of travel.
This cues 82-year-old Lou Davis to enter stage right, welcoming flyers with a question he has asked thousands of times during his 57 years as a skycap at Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport.
“Where we goin’ today?”
Davis has worked at the airport longer than any other current employee. As a skycap, he moves among tasks with grace, cheerily guiding the line of passengers through check-in and on to their gates.
“It don’t take me nothing but a minute. They say, ‘You are so fast. You are so good.’ Yeah, after 57 years, you know how to do it just right,” Davis said, chuckling to himself.
Then he spotted another customer and quickly turned back to work. “Where we goin’ today?” he asked. It’s the second rush of passengers since Davis arrived at 3:30 a.m. for his shift for a company that contracts for United Airlines. This wave this morning was mostly headed to Newark and Denver.
Davis has a couple of hours before he’s scheduled to leave for the day.
Decked neatly in a uniform that still looks freshly pressed, he moves through his shift with the energy of a man half his age, cracking jokes before lifting bags onto the belt and estimating their weight.
“As matter of a fact I can lift that bag
“Just have them feel so nice and secure and everything. That’s my job. Make them feel good. And I think I’ve been doing a real good job doing that.” Lou Davis 82-year-old skycap at Sky Harbor
and I won’t be off. This one is 42 pounds. No ... a little less than that,” he said.
He weighed the bag. It clocked in at 38 pounds.
Sky Harbor over the years
A lot has changed since Davis started his career at Sky Harbor in 1962, the same year Terminal 2, where he works now, opened.
While many Phoenix residents wonder why Sky Harbor doesn’t have a Terminal 1, Davis remembers when it did.
He started his career at Terminal 1, which the airport says was the first “modern” terminal when it was completed in October 1952 for just $853,000.
By comparison, Sky Harbor’s next 20-year-plan will cost an estimated $5.7 billion. The plan calls for the demolition of Terminal 2 in 2020, just like it did roughly 30 years ago when Terminal 1 was torn down.
Davis recalls what Sky Harbor was like in the early days of his career when there was just Terminal 1 and a new Terminal 2: Fewer passengers. No security lines. No taxi queues. No baggage fees.
On rainy days, he’d hold an umbrella above the heads of passengers as they walked from Terminal 1 to board their planes. At that time, only three airlines operated from Sky Harbor: Cochise, Bonanza and Continental.
“That was a long time ago,” he said. Davis has outlasted a terminal and at least three airlines.
His favorite part of the job: People
If you ask Davis what has kept him at his job for 57 years, his answer is quick. It’s the people.
There are the famous names that have passed through, such as Muhammad Ali and Barry Goldwater. But Davis just likes being around people in general.
He’s aware that many people he meets don’t travel often or save up for a long time to afford their flights. He feels it is important to make them feel at ease.
“Just have them feel so nice and secure and everything. That’s my job. Make them feel good. And I think I’ve been doing a real good job doing that,” Davis said.
Noreen Dieter greets him by name as she checks in for her flight to Denver. She said she looks forward to seeing Davis when she flies through Terminal 2.
“He’s wonderful. Most of these guys are great but Lou’s exceptional because he goes above and beyond,” Dieter said.
“Where we going today?” Lou called to another woman in line.
“Denver. Where there is a lot of snow,” the gray-haired woman replied with a sigh.
Davis peered at her through his wirerimmed glasses. “Ma’am, where’s your big coat? You got it in your bag?” he asked, half-serious, half-joking.
As he finished checking her in, he asked if she needed a hug.
“I know I do! I want to take you with me!” the woman said.
Deborah Ostreicher, Sky Harbor’s assistant aviation director, isn’t surprised that regulars appreciate Davis.
She first met him when she started at the airport in the 1990s and said that if you’re a regular traveler, you can’t miss him.
“Lou is a jovial, happy, wonderful representation of the airport, just like many of his colleagues that have been here for decades,” Ostreicher said.
She’s proud to point out that Sky Harbor has several employees with more than 50 years of service, though Davis has the longest tenure.
No plans to retire
Davis sometimes travels himself. Two of his three kids work for Southwest Airlines. Originally from Baltimore, he occasionally flies back to visit family. But like most local residents, he prefers Arizona’s climate.
“I love Phoenix. Cold weather? I can’t stand it no more. Brrrr,” he said.
A customer hands him a tip. “For your retirement,” the man joked.
Davis’ wife is retired. He tried to retire once, too, but laughed as he explained that it lasted just 15 days because he missed the people and the bustle of the airport.
Now he works three days a week. He said it gives him spending money for new shoes or a shirt. When Terminal 2’s airlines move to Terminal 3 in 2020, so will he.
“No, I have no plans (to retire) and I feel good at my age and everything,” he said.
Even if his health took a turn, Davis said, he’d still want to be out in the middle of this dance of travel, helping direct folks to their destinations.
“I’m going to be here in a wheelchair, ‘Ma’am can I help you?’ ” he laughs.