Courage showcased in Pan Am Airlines’ crews
My mother used to lament the air travel she remembered from when she was young. Whenever we flew, she would talk about days past in which one would find a new outfit to fly in because it was an occasion. The show, the glamour, the service, and the privilege it was to fly in the ’60s and ’70s. These are the times described in Julia Cooke’s “Come Fly the World.”
Pan American World Airways, or Pan Am, and the women who made up the debonair crews of the famed airline are the subject of Cooke’s book. I only ever have read and heard of Pan Am, as the now defunct airline ceased operations before my time. Through firsthand accounts of several former flight attendants, Cooke was able to tell the tale of several decades of Pan Am’s history.
A poignant theme throughout the book is Pan Am’s involvement in the Vietnam War, a fact I knew nothing of until now. During the war, Pan Am received a sizeable contract from the U.S. government to shuttle soldiers to and from Saigon. Whether leaving the war torn country or sent to face the horrors of battle, the men developed significant bonds with the flight crews.
In an emotional account, a soldier told a tearful flight attendant, “It’s really nice to see that someone really cares what happens to us.” The women on these crews hardly knew if they would ever see any of the servicemen again, or what would happen to them.
It was apparently common to be fired at by Vietnamese soldiers while flying through the warzone, with some Pan Am planes bearing the scars of bullet holes. Pan Am’s involvement during the fall of Saigon is particularly interesting, as scenes described almost mirror the images that came from Afghanistan in 2021.
The women of Pan Am, and the airline industry as a whole, saw great change in their field. Cooke discusses the evolution of what it meant to be a flight attendant throughout the decades of the jet age; including uniforms, marketing campaigns, and executive roles.
The book is filled with information I never had considered or known and was a real pleasure to read and learn. I may lament an era of travel I never knew, but luckily there are people who lived and worked in a time someone my age can only imagine to share their stories for others to put together. “Come Fly the World” gives great insight into an industry and form of travel I have always loved. While slow at times and filled with loads of information, I enjoyed this book tremendously.