Flying High This Past Week: 5 April-12 April

A continued thank you to all my readers and visitors with a special shout out to those who have added comments. When I first started this blog in 2009, the articles were really just short paragraphs on some part of aviation history I had come across in my reading that I wanted to share. Those posts were daily- a trip through the archives shows that to be the case- but as my family grew, there was less time to do daily posts, so I shifted over to more detailed articles that were posted every several days which is the current format. I have been considering adding shorter articles that would be on a more frequent basis or as a filler in between the five day interval of my longer articles. I certainly don't think it will be daily, but I'd like to have more frequent additions to the blog that at least dovetail with my current work and family obligations. We'll see, stay tuned for what I come up with. In the meantime, my more in-depth articles will continue to be posted here every five days. Without further ado, here's what's been getting a lot of hits in the past week here at TAILS THROUGH TIME:

• The Development of the Boeing Flying Boom: Quite obviously the most recent article usually tops our weekly round up and my most recent posting on how Boeing came up with the flying boom for aerial refueling certainly continues that trend. What I found most fascinating out of my reading for that posting was not just Boeing's process for determining the best positioning for aerial refueling, but that at one point Boeing considered for commercial jetliners as well.  
•  The Early History of the Air Line Pilots Association, ALPA: The previous article to the one on the Boeing flying boom still continues to get plenty of hits! The early history of Northwest Airlines is weaved into the early history of ALPA as the founder of the union, Dave Behncke, was Northwest's first pilot and flew its first passengers in 1927. The early history of ALPA gives us a good look at the state of the airline industry in the 1920s which was just on the cusp of making the leap into greater technologies led off by the Boeing 247 and Douglas DC-3. Despite the landmark in aviation history those aircraft were, flying for many professional pilots was still a hazardous profession in the years prior and many airline heads of the day tried to do what they could to stamp out ALPA in its early days. Fortunately a strike at a small airline that ran between St. Louis and Chicago thrust ALPA into the national spotlight and won it friends in high places.
• Vought's Not-So-Fearsome F6U Pirate: The Pirate was the first of setbacks that put Vought on the ropes as a fighter manufacturer for the US Navy. A series of misfortunes, the significant of which was its weak Westinghouse J34 engine, hit the program and by the time the F6U was ready for service, it was quickly overshadowed by superior aircraft like the McDonnell F2H Banshee and the Grumman F9F Panther. Some believe Vought over-compensated for the failures of the F6U Pirate with its next fighter, the F7U Cutlass. But they most certainly hit it out of the park with their third try that resulted in the F8U Crusader. 
• The A-6E TRAM: Making the Grumman Intruder More Lethal: The A-6E was the first major design upgrade of the Intruder over the A-6A that was introduced into combat in Vietnam. Many of the advances of the A-6E were in the miniaturization of its electronics and that created an opportunity to utilize the space created to add full all-weather/night attack capability in the form of TRAM- Target Recognition Attack Multi-Sensor.
• Lockheed's Own L-1000 Jet Engine: Believe it or not in the waning days of the Second World War, Lockheed was developing its own jet engine that, when compared with the current state of the art in jet turbines of the day, was quite advanced. The L-1000 would have had the service designation J37 had it been launched into production in 1947. 

The next article goes up later tonight, it will cover the origins and history of the barrier airborne early warning patrols over the Pacific and Atlantic that extended out the US radar fence from the continental United States to try and provide as much lead time as possible for a Russian bomber attack. Stay tuned! 

Flying High This Past Week: 30 March-5 April

A day late on posting the latest edition of Flying High This Past Week, but no worries, here's what's been getting a lot of hits lately here at TAILS THROUGH TIME:

• The Early History of the Air Line Pilots Association, ALPA: Quite obviously the latest article on TAILS THROUGH TIME is going to be getting the most hits in the past week! The early history of Northwest Airlines is weaved into the early history of ALPA as the founder of the union, Dave Behncke, was Northwest's first pilot and flew its first passengers in 1927. The early history of ALPA gives us a good look at the state of the airline industry in the 1920s which was just on the cusp of making the leap into greater technologies led off by the Boeing 247 and Douglas DC-3. Despite the landmark in aviation history those aircraft were, flying for many professional pilots was still a hazardous profession in the years prior and many airline heads of the day tried to do what they could to stamp out ALPA in its early days. Fortunately a strike at a small airline that ran between St. Louis and Chicago thrust ALPA into the national spotlight and won it friends in high places. 
• Francis Gary Powers: After the Return: Best known as the Lockheed U-2 pilot that was shot down over the Soviet Union in May 1960 that ended US overflights of the USSR, his return to the United States was less than hospitable as the Director of Central Intelligence sought to blame Powers for any number of error that resulted in his shoot down despite being cleared by a CIA damage assessment team, the USAF, and a formal board of inquiry. Recognition of Powers' integrity and bravery were finally acknowledged posthumously in 2000 on the 40th anniversary of his shoot down. Note the comment at the bottom of my article by Powers' son, Francis Gary Powers Jr, who is the founder of the Cold War Museum! 
• The First Steps to a Turboprop Transport, Part Two: The Boeing YC-97J was a Stratofreighter that was modified with Pratt & Whitney T34 turboprops so the USAF could gain operating experience with the new class of engines before the Lockheed C-130 Hercules and Douglas C-133 Cargomaster become operational. Two KC-97Gs were converted to use the same engines and propellers as what would be used on the upcoming C-133. 
• Soviet Wild Weasels, Part One: Doctrine/Tactics: This was the first part of a three article series I did back in 2010 on the differences between American and Soviet SEAD (suppression of enemy air defenses) doctrines. The second part looked at the aircraft that functioned as the Soviet equivalent of the Wild Weasels and the third part looked at the missiles used by those aircraft. 
• Frontier Airlines and the Boeing 737-200: In the 1970s, Denver-based Frontier Airlines (the first incarnation, not the current one flying) became one of the most significant operators of the Boeing 737-200. Originally investing in the Boeing 727-100/200, the switch to the 737-200 and its better operating economics for Frontier's route system undoubtedly helped the airline weather the economic roller coaster that buffeted the US economy in the 1970s.

The next article will be posted tomorrow night and it will cover the development of the Boeing flying boom used in air refueling. Remember, every five days a new article is posted here at TAILS THROUGH TIME and you'll never be quite sure until then where in aviation history we'll be flying!

The Early History of the Air Line Pilots Association, ALPA

David L. Behncke, founder of ALPA

The early history of the Air Line Pilots Association union is singularly identified with David Behncke. Born on a farm in Wisconsin to immigrant German parents in 1897, Behncke joined the Army in 1916 and would get his pilot wings and a commission as a second lieutenant in 1917. Following his Army service, he flew around the Midwest and Great Lakes region in the 1920s with his own barnstorming outfit as well as participating in air races. To supplement his income, he made a bit of a local name for himself in Illinois flying custom tailored suits from Chicago to various cities. It was in this capacity he came to the attention of a Minneapolis businessman, Charles Dickenson, who had just been awarded a lucrative air mail contract between Minneapolis and Chicago. Behncke became Dickenson Airlines' first pilot in 1926. Designated Air Mail Route 9, Dickenson had trouble with his nascent operation and was threatened with the loss of his air mail contract. A syndicate of Detroit and Minneapolis businessmen led by Lewis H. Brittin bought Dickenson out and reformed his airline as Northwest Airways, Northwest Airlines' predecessor. Northwest moved into passenger transport like many of the air mail carriers of the day and it was David Behncke who flew Northwest's first passengers on 1 February 1927. 

An airline pilot's fortunes in those days waxed and waned often at the whim of the airline owners and before long, Behncke changed jobs and by 1928 was flying for Boeing Air Transport out of Chicago, which later become United Airlines. It was during this transition period that Behncke starting contemplating organizing airline pilots into a union which wouldn't be limited to one airline, but encompass pilots from other airlines as well. Flying professionally in the 1920s was still a hazardous job and for many airlines, the attitude of the owners was typical for the 1920s that espoused an accumulation of wealth with little regard for the workers. For the airlines of the day, this meant the pilots were often low paid on top of what was already considered a hazardous job. There were two main factors that led to Behncke to move forward with his plans for a pilots' union. The first one was off course the "robber baron" attitudes of the day. Even though passengers were increasing in numbers, it was the air mail contracts that made money and the US Post Office paid airlines by the pound. It wasn't unusual in those days for airlines to mail heavy useless items to pad their bill and get more from the Post Office. Many individuals who ran airlines became quite wealthy as a consequence and for a average low paid pilot who routinely saw the sorts of things done to boost air mail profits, it was unsettling. Many of the pilots of the day served in the First World War and rightly proud of their services and felt that what was going on in those days was contrary to how they ended up with their pilots' wings. The industrialist E.L. Cord who was an early owner of what become American Airlines, for instance, wasn't shy about stating his low regard for the pilots of the airlines he owned. "Any normal person can handle an airplane" he declared in 1930. 

The practice of pilot pushing was the second factor. Even with the carriage of passengers, there was tremendous pressure on pilots to fly with poorly repaired aircraft or in unsafe weather conditions. Many airlines offered financial incentives to pilots who would take a flight that had been turned down by a fellow pilot. With the Depression underway, there were plenty of out of work pilots to replace pilots who refused for fly for safety or weather reasons. In the 1920s there was a social organization of pilots called the National Air Pilots Association, NAPA. In 1928 while still working for what become United Airlines, Behncke was elected to a high position in NAPA and he urged the organization to take a vocal stand against pilot pushing by adopting the slogan "Don't overfly a brother pilot!". Unfortunately only a small fraction of NAPA's members were professional pilots and Behncke's proposals fell on deaf ears. Behncke felt the financial incentives to fly in unsafe conditions were the worst evil of the profession. In fact, in 1928 most air mail pilots only had about a 25% chance of surviving several years flying the line. For many airline owners, the loss of an aircraft and pilot were easy costs to absorb given the lucrative air mail rates of the day. 

Behncke decided he had to form a union on his own and by early 1931 word was out what Behncke was up to. Many of the airline heads that would later have formative roles in the US airline and commercial aircraft industry were quite intense in their anti-union opinions. The iconic head of United Airlines, for example, Pat Patterson, quite openly declared that "Nobody can belong to a union and fly for United!". Gathering up twenty four trusted fellow pilots from other airlines, Behncke and the so-called "Key Men" met at the Morrison Hotel in Chicago on 27 July 1931 to form the Air Line Pilots Association, ALPA. Because of the intense dislike of their activities by their respective employers, the "Key Men" were referred to by letter codes in an attempt to hide their roles from their employers. Bryon Warner of United, for example, was known as "Mr. A". While that date is considered the birth of ALPA, a year prior Behncke did meet with a closed inner circle from three different airlines to set the wheels in motion for the 1931 meeting. They were Walter Hallgren and Lawrence Harris from American, R. Lee Smith of Northwest, J.L. Brandon of United, and another United pilot whose name is lost to history as he had switched over to management not long after the 1930 meeting- the so called "Lost Founder" of ALPA. 

As membership of ALPA grew in that first year, Behncke had to move the operation out of his home and into a two-room suite at a Chicago hotel. Many pilots were tired of how they were treated at their respective airlines but many airline managers were quite open in their threats to fire anyone joining ALPA. Many of the "Key Men" from the 1931 meeting did end up losing their jobs. And if the airline didn't fire you for joining ALPA, they certainly did what they could to make you miserable. TWA, for example, often shuttled pilots among different crew bases at short notice in an effort to make their families' lives difficult as well. Schedules were often used punitively against anyone even suspected of ALPA membership. Many pilots who weren't fired found themselves demoted from airliners to open cockpit biplanes flying mail at night. Many airline managers felt they needed to stamp out ALPA quickly before it gained momentum. Eddie Rickenbacker of Eastern Air Lines in particular became a lifelong foe of the union. 

E.L. Cord from the 18 January 1932 cover of Time

In 1932, Behncke was working on getting ALPA affiliated with the American Federation of Labor (AFL) when a strike at a small airline thrust him and ALPA into the national spotlight. E.L. Cord was an aggressive businessman that in a few short years via acquisition headed an impressive industrial and transportation conglomerate that started out with automakers of the day given his background as an auto salesman for Auburn Auto. In fact, Auburn Auto was one of his first acquisitions in 1924, turning the company around to the point it was introducing several new models a year, but this was accomplished by a ruthless attack on labor costs that would set the pattern of his business dealings in future corporate acquisitions. In short order, he acquired Dusenburg Automobiles as well as both Yellow Cab and Checker Cab. He then moved into aviation, acquiring Stinson Aircraft (he was a private pilot who owned a Stinson Detroiter) and Lycoming Engines. Cord owned Stinson Aircraft when the company produced the Stinson Trimotor. It competed for airline orders with the Ford Trimotor, which cost $40,000. Cord's eye towards draconian cuts in labor costs meant he could offer the Stinson Trimotor for only $25,000. In 1930 he decided to get into the airline business seeing the profit potential with air mail subsidies. He started Century Airlines which began flying in March 1931 with three daily round trips between Chicago and St. Louis via Springfield and three daily round trips between Chicago and Cleveland via Toledo. And quite naturally, Century Airlines flew Stinson Trimotors. He then set up other similar airlines around the nation, all with "Century" as part of their name. In addition, he acquired other smaller carriers like a small Texas-based outfit called American Airways. Lacking a lucrative air mail contract, Cord cut costs as far down as he could, reasoning that if he could operate his airlines at half the cost of the established airlines, air mail contracts those airlines had would be canceled and given to him. With lower costs already, he stood to make a significant profit as a result. He had figured out he could pay pilots as little as $150/month at his Century Pacific operation between San Francisco and Los Angeles and still find pilots willing to work for him. Century Airlines based in Chicago had higher paid pilots at $350/month which was still quite a bit lower than the industry standard of the day. Since he was getting away with only $150/month with Century Pacific, Cord cut the salaries of the 25 pilots working at Century Airlines to $150. The chief pilot at Century, Duke Skonning, called the rates "starvation wages" and wanted to bargain with Cord. Cord agreed to a 10-day period before instituting the new wage cut, but he had no intention of bargaining with the pilots who already held in disregard. At the end of the 10-day period, as each Century flight arrived at Chicago Midway (it was called Chicago Municipal back then), each pilot was escorted off the plane by Cord's guards and made to sign a new agreement to $150/month. Every single pilot refused, setting off the first strike in the airline industry. Those pilots now locked out, showed up at Behncke's door led by their chief pilot, Duke Skonning, who told Behncke "Well, here we are. We have been locked out. What is the Association going to do about it?"

Behncke's work to get affiliated with the AFL paid off quickly. Immediately the AFL had its Chicago chapter work with ALPA and the striking pilots. Behncke asked each ALPA member at other airlines to chip in $25 to help pay the bills of the striking Century pilots. Soon radio spots were airing throughout Chicago to bring attention to the Century strike. Cord quickly hired strikebreakers but before they could show up for work, ALPA members would meet with them to explain what was stake. Most still went to work with Cord, but some stayed with ALPA with the promise of help finding a non-strikebreaking flying job. This infuriated Cord who then sequestered his new hires under armed guard at the airport. This in turn angered the City Council of Chicago who didn't like Cord treating city property as a prison. He was subpoenaed to appear before the council but Cord snubbed them, which further hurt his cause. The AFL made sure Congress knew of Cord's actions and this was how ALPA gained its first political ally- Representative Fiorello La Guardia from New York emerged to champion ALPA's cause in Congress. It spawned a friendship between David Behncke and La Guardia that lasted long after La Guardia become mayor of New York City. With congressional pressure on him, Cord sent a letter to each member of Congress referring to ALPA and the Century pilots on strike as communists- since most pilots had military backgrounds, this backfired on Cord and set many Congressional officials against him to side with ALPA. Cord's luck was running out fast and in 1932 he gave up control (but not ownership) of his airline ventures. They were all folded into holding company and in short order a few years later rebranded as American Air Lines. Cord dispatched one of his young executives to Texas to run the airline for him- an accountant named C. R. Smith, who would come to lead American Airlines until 1968. Putting Smith in charge was his concession to Congress to avoid getting American's air mail contracts canceled as a penalty. 

By 1936, Behncke found pilot jobs for all of the striking pilots from Century Airlines. He also made sure all the strikebreakers at Century were exposed. It was in an editorial that Behncke first used the term "scab" in reference to airline labor practices. Many of those strikebreaking pilots found it difficult to find jobs in the industry and Behncke did agree to take them into ALPA for assistance finding work provided each striking pilot from Century Airlines found work first. The Century Airlines strike gave ALPA national recognition which wouldn't have been possible without the help of the AFL and the friendship of Fiorello La Guardia. But with a newfound stature and friends in all the right places, many of the airlines that only a few years earlier tried to stamp out ALPA now quietly acquiesced its presence among its pilot ranks. 

Source: Flying the Line: The First Half Century of the Air Line Pilots Association by George E. Hopkins. The Air Line Pilots Association Press, 1982, pp 10-53. The Wisconsin Aviation Hall of Fame http://www.wisconsinaviationhalloffame.org/. Photos: The Wisconsin Aviation Hall of Fame, Time magazine.

Flying High This Past Week: 23 March-29 March

Don't forget that the new URL for TAILS THROUGH TIME is now www.tailsthroughtime.com. The old blogspot URL will still work, though. Consider it a quick NOTAM! I suppose a sign you've moved up in the blogosphere is when a Wikipedia article lists one of your articles as a source! It was an Wikipedia entry on the Pratt & Whitney J58 engine that powered the Lockheed SR-71 Blackbird and my blog article on the Mach 3 Phantom proposal is listed as a reference in the sources. This past week was one of the unusual weeks that two articles get posted in a week, so obviously we'll lead off with those two articles on this week's edition of Flying High This Past Week: 

• The Rise and Fall of Mohawk Airlines and Opening the Door for Frank Lorenzo: Mohawk Airlines began operations in 1944 as Robinson Air Lines, connecting Ithaca, New York, with Teterboro Airport in New Jersey. By 1952 one of the pilots at Robinson eventually took over the airline and renamed it Mohawk following an employee contest for a new name. Mohawk and its new president, Bob Peach, were legendary among local service carriers as they were the first of the second tier of airlines to operate pure jet equipment and it was Peach's determination to operate pure jets that gained him the respect of his peers in the industry. Unfortunately circumstances would doom Mohawk to the point that it had to choose between joining its long time rival, Allegheny Airlines, or a young smooth talking New York businessman whose name became infamous in the US airline industry- Frank Lorenzo. 
• Proving the Harrier Carrier: The idea of a V/STOL equipped light carrier that is sort of like the modern day equivalent of the light escort carriers of the Second World War had its genesis in the austere budgetary environment that came at the end of the Vietnam War. The Chief of Naval Operations, Admiral Elmo Zumwalt, championed a cheaper alternative to the supercarrier called the Sea Control Ship that would use the new AV-8A Harrier as the sharp point of its spear. While the Navy never went forward with the SCS concept, many of our allies paid close attention and the US Marine Corps in particular would use the experience to base the Harrier and now Harrier II aboard the big deck amphibs of the "Gator Navy".
• Two's Company and Three's A Crowd: The Boeing 737-200 Flight Crew Controversy: This article from the week before last is still getting plenty of hits. I suppose that we are all looking at the number of crew in the flight deck with a different eye these days in light of the Germanwings tragedy. 
• Operation Teaball: Network-Centric Real-Time Intelligence in Vietnam: While the tools the US military used to restore the fighting effectiveness of its combat pilots are varied, one of the more interesting tools in the renaissance of the fighter pilot in the skies over Vietnam was the use of real-time intelligence to increase the situational awareness of pilots who were operating in the skies over North Vietnam.
• The Early Days of Airbus Industrie and How the A300 Got Its Name: I don't know what interests me more- the political machinations of 1960s Europe that led to the formation of Airbus or the fact that the A300 designation sprang out of a light hearted joke. Given the juggernaut that Airbus has become in the world commercial aircraft market, it's beginnings were much less assured and much more tenuous at best. 
• How American Airlines Shaped the A300: Related to the prior linked article on the early days of Airbus Industrie, even though American Airlines didn't operate the Airbus A300 until April 1988 as the launch customer for the A300-600R variant, one of its VPs, Frank Kolk, back in the 1960s had a tremendous influence in shaping the final design of the A300. The A300 was much closer to Kolk's specification for a widebody twin that he authored in 1967 than the eventual aircraft that sprang from Kolk's requirements, the Douglas DC-10 and the Lockheed L-1011 Tristar. 
• The Ryan FR-1 Fireball and F2R Dark Shark: An Evolutionary Dead End: Probably the pinnacle of mixed-propulsion fighter aircraft, these two Ryan fighter designs of the Navy represented a rather simple but effective remedy to the shortfalls of jet engines in the immediate postwar era.

Remember that new blog articles are posted every five days. The next article will be going up on April 2nd, so stay tuned. And for those who missed it, this is last week's edition of Flying High This Past Week. 

Flying High This Past Week 16 March-22 March

First a bit of housekeeping. This week I switched this blog over to have its own domain name at www.tailsthroughtime.com. The previous address of aviationtrivia.blogspot.com still works and you'll get a redirect notice if you use the old link that will take you to the new URL. Now, without further ado, here's what's been getting a lot of page views this past week here at TAILS THROUGH TIME:

• Two's Company and Three's a Crowd: The Boeing 737-200 Flight Crew Controversy: Quite naturally the latest post to the blog would be the most popular in the past week! The question of whether the 737-200 required two flight crew or three created quite a bit of acrimony in the late 1960s when the aircraft was introduced. Nowhere else was the dispute more pronounced than at United Air Lines, one of Boeing's key customers for the new jet.
• The Crazy Cats: The Lockheed Neptunes of the US Army: Yes, you read that right. The *Army*. In Vietnam, the Army found that it needed a bigger and longer ranged aircraft for the SIGINT/COMINT role that today's Guardrail aircraft perform. Intraservice rivalries being what they were then, the Navy stepped up to help the Army and offered some P-2 Neptunes from stateside Reserve squadrons for modification so the Army wouldn't have to deal with what was then a very prickly USAF. The AP-2Es (a spurious designation to avoid antagonizing the USAF) were the heaviest and most complex Neptune variant to take to the skies. Many of the SIGINT/COMINT equipment used on the Army Neptunes would influence the development of the Guardrail system used today by the Army. 
• The N-20 Program: Switzerland's First Indigenous Jet Aircraft: The Federal Aircraft Factory (FAF) N-20 Aiguillon was an attractive flying wing fighter design that only got as far as taxi tests and some very short hops short of a true first flight before being canceled. The Aiguillon had two flying forebears, though, that contributed to the flight test program and development of this aborted fighter design.
• Tupolev's Own Tristar Design: It's not unusual for the Russian design bureaus (called OKBs) to reuse designations. The Tu-204 that flies today is actually the third use of that designation. The first use was for an enlarged T-tailed jet development of the Tu-134/Tu-154 and the second use of the designation was for a widebody trijet that looked very much like the Lockheed L-1011 Tristar. 
• The Rocket-Boosted P-51 Mustang: In 1945 the USAAF's Mustangs were besting the Messerschmitt Me 262 jets over their German bases where the jets were most vulnerable. As a result of augmented airfield defenses, work turned to a rocket-boosted P-51 that would have the speed to catch the Me 262 at altitude and not have to run the gauntlet of airfield defenses.
• The Legend of Half-Moon Bay: In this day and age when most of us are jaded to air travel and complaints about airlines are the norm, from the 1962 Christmas season is a unparalleled story of ingenuity and a can-do spirit by airline employees to go the extra mile. I won't spoil it here, but let's just say we'd all be hard pressed to come up with anything that equals what a small California airline pulled off that year, creating the "Legend of Half Moon Bay"!

The next TAILS THROUGH TIME article goes up tomorrow night, 23 March. Stay tuned! 

Two's Company and Three's A Crowd: The Boeing 737-200 Flight Crew Controversy

In the late 1950s and early 1960s propliners still served a lot of the shorter routes in the US domestic market as jets were becoming the fashionable on the longer routes where the time savings of the jets over propliners was most apparent. However, the travelling public was irreversibly enamored with jet aircraft for travel and soon shorter domestic routes would be singing with jet noise- the first designs for the medium-range domestic routes, the Convair 880 and the Boeing 720, were too large and uneconomical to operate on short-range routes. Boeing responded with the 727 which would prove to be one of its outstanding commercial successes, but airlines were looking for an even smaller jet. By the early 1960s the Douglas DC-9, BAC 1-11, and the Sud-Aviation Caravelle were established in the market and Boeing's smallest offering, the 727-100, was too big for most short-range routes. When long-time Boeing customer American Airlines turned to Great Britain for the BAC 1-11 for a short-range jet to complement its 727 services, the engineers at Renton got yet another kick in the pants to produce an offering to compete with the twin-jets. 

With the first generation of twin-jets disproving the skeptics that thought short-range routes would too uneconomical for jets, Boeing designers aimed for a small twin jet that was more flexible than the existing competition that could not only fly into smaller communities and smaller airports, but would blend seamlessly with larger jet operations at major airports. Key in making this possible was the decision by 737 lead engineer John Steiner to make the new 737 the same cross-section as the 707 and the 727. This would give the 737 the lead in comfort by offering 3-3 seating whereas the competition could only offer 3-2 seating. For the first time, big jet comfort was possible on shorter sectors. 

A United Boeing 737-200 in its delivery livery, the Mainliner scheme.

But the design decision had an unforeseen consequence that would result in considerable controversy between the pilots, the airlines, and the FAA who would be certifying the aircraft. At the time, the FAA had imposed a limit on the size of aircraft that could be operated by a two-man flight crew- it was set at 80,000 pounds maximum takeoff weight (MTOW). This limit dictated the size of the first DC-9s and as the BAC 1-11s were below the limit, Braniff and American who had ordered One-Elevens operated them with two-man crews. Aircraft over the 80,000 pound limit required three crew in the cockpit. Boeing's original 737 proposals weighed in at 79,000 pounds, but potential customers found the design too small. Eastern and United in particular wanted a larger aircraft. Even despite a rule change by the FAA raising the two-man crew limit to 90,000 pounds, the revised 737 design needed a three-man crew as it tipped the scales at 93,000 pounds. 

In April 1965 the FAA announced that it was abolishing the weight limit criteria and from then on, aircraft would be certified for two-crew operation on an individual basis. This followed two years of deliberation and consultations with the pilots' unions, airline managers, airframe manufacturers and human factors studies. 

Of the four major airlines in the US at the time ("The Big Four"), three had already made their choices in the short-range jet category. Eastern and TWA ordered the DC-9 and American ordered the BAC 1-11. That left United as the only major interested in the 737. Of the early orders for the 737, only United's order was sizable (40 -200s ordered in 1965). Lufthansa also had a significant order, but they weren't encumbered by the FAA-mandated weight restrictions on two-man crew operations. However, United's managers found the 737 to have a political disadvantage since the pilots' unions at the time felt that as the largest of the twin jets available, it should be operated with a crew of three. While expensive for the airlines in terms of labor costs, the 737 design from the outset was intended for a two-man crew. Only a small jumpseat was available on the flight deck.

Now the third crew issue had already been visited previously before the introduction of aircraft like the 737. In the late 1950s the Lockheed Electra sparked considerable debate among its customer airlines. However, in each of the three cases, the issue was deferred- Eastern's dispute revolved around whether or not the third crew should be a pilot or a flight engineer. In the cases involving National and Western, ALPA used the two-crew issue as a test case to set a precedent (even though the Electra was never intended to be used by two pilots). National put the issue in arbitration that deferred the issue. Western's management was more inflexible and for four months a pilots' strike nearly grounded Western until it was agreed by both parties to defer the issue. So from a precedent standpoint, the impending dispute over the 737 flight deck had no prior rulings or standards to build upon for either side involved. 

In late 1965 Boeing showed a mockup of the 737 cockpit to representatives from United's ALPA union, the FAA, and airline managers. While the FAA felt that the mockup was inconclusive from a certification standpoint, the pilots' union disapproved of the two-man cockpit. A year later, a working mockup that was "functional" and more detailed to test workloads was presented and again the United pilots balked at the layout for two-crew. Not long afterward, ALPA's leadership made it the union's official recommendation that the 737 be operated with a three-man crew at all times. During this same time, the pilots' contract at United was up for negotiation and the 737 crew issue became a major stumbling block in the discussions for a new contract. To further complicate the picture, the FAA at the same time also tentatively approved two-man operation of the 737 pending the start of flight testing in 1967. 

By 1967 the dispute at United still had not been settled and a presidential mediation board was convened to help in reaching a compromise between ALPA and United's management. That summer the board failed in reconciling both sides and a strike vote taken showed 92% of United's pilots in favor of striking if the 737 couldn't be operated by a three-man crew. As an effort to reach out for a compromise, ALPA proposed to the FAA that the 737 as well as the BAC 1-11 and DC-9 be operated with a three-man crew. This proposal provoked the ire of the airlines that already had the One-Eleven and the DC-9 in service and the proposal was quietly shelved with the assent of ALPA members at those other airlines. By this point the dispute was discouraging further US sales of the 737 and indirectly helped Douglas with it's DC-9 which now offered increased capacity versions to regional airlines since it had already set the precedent for two crew operations with the first DC-9 Series 10 models. 

N9013U "Mainliner City of Charlotte"

The 737 made its maiden flight in April 1967 and over the Thanksgiving holiday week of that year, the FAA decided to run a series of tests to put the crew number issue to rest. One of the 737s was borrowed from Boeing and two-crew operations would be tested in the busy Boston-New York-Washington corridor. One pilot was from Boeing, the other pilot from the FAA. Two round-trips were made each day that week in both day and night conditions, both VFR and IFR weather conditions, as well as operations below minimum landing conditions, diversion operations, simulated instrument failures and even simulated crew incapacitation (could one pilot fly the 737 to safety). As a result of these tests, the FAA issued the following statement:

"The far-reaching evaluation of the Boeing 737 was started in September 1965, with the evaluation of the cockpit mock-up. Continuous evaluations over the past two years included regular operations of the aircraft in a high-density air traffic environment to determine workload, complexity, and safety of operations in a fail-safe concept. These flights were part of a very extensive flight-testing programme accomplished by the FAA and Boeing personnel. The technical findings coming out of these evaluations are that the aircraft can be safely flown with a minimum of two pilots."

Certification by the FAA of both the 737-100 and 737-200 followed in December 1967 for full airline operations. 

The third flight deck crew sat on the jumpseat on United 737-200s

Despite the issue being settled by the FAA, several airline pilot unions continued the crew issue as a bargaining chip in labor negotiations with airline management. Anxious to avert a strike in 1967, United reached an agreement with ALPA as part of a broader contract agreement to crew the 737-200 with a crew of three. Western Airlines, Frontier Airlines, and Wien Air Alaska were the only other US airlines bound by contract agreements with the pilots' union to use three crew in the flight deck. Frontier and Wien switched to a two-crew flight deck in 1976 and 1979 respectively. It wasn't until 1981 (ostensibly due to the impending introduction of the 737-300) that United finally went to a two-crew operation on the 737-200. At United, the third crewman sat in the jumpseat which is sited immediately in front of the cockpit door. Duties of the third crewman included preflight, performing the checklists, performance calculations (weight, balance, takeoff and landing distances, etc.) and company communications. All the relevant controls such as radio, electrical, hydraulic and other functions necessary were reachable from the jumpseat. Once United reverted to a two-crew flight deck in 1981, no modifications were necessary to the -200 cockpits.

Source: Boeing 737 (Crowood Aviation Series) by Malcolm L. Hill. Crowood Publishing, 2002, pp 23-31. Photos: Bob Garrard Collection/Flickr, JP Santiago