Higher by Russ Banham

Author:Russ Banham [Russ Banham]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Chronicle Books LLC
Published: 2015-06-28T16:00:00+00:00

The new 707 provided a quicker, smoother, more comfortable flight. Promotional materials featured families to assure passengers of the safety of the jet planes.

A schematic of the 707-220 shows the plane’s dimensions.

This democratization of air travel was supported by basic economics. By transporting more passengers in larger planes traveling greater distances, airlines could charge reduced fares. For the first time, pretty much anyone could take to the skies. Increasingly, people did just that: the volume of passengers carried vaulted from 16.7 million people in 1948 to 35.5 million in 1954. Passenger travel had more than doubled in just six years.

These are remembered as the glamour days of jet travel, when boarding a plane was an event akin to boarding a cruise ship—an occasion people dressed up for. Prior to takeoff, the pilots walked up the aisles, giving children enameled metal pins with flight wings on them. Passengers in all classes received printed menus from which they could order a variety of free entrées and cocktails. Elegantly attired flight attendants served food and beverages to passengers, who dined on seatback tray tables, a novelty.

Once they were in the air, the biggest surprise for many first-time jet passengers was the noise—or lack thereof. Flight attendants no longer had to hand out earplugs. The only surprising sound passengers heard was the whine of the landing gear being elevated and lowered. In the days of piston-engine aircraft, the engines had drowned out this sound.

Flying in a jet plane became the thing to do. Celebrities who traversed the world by air were described as being members of the Jet Set. Even the president of the United States traveled on a 707. Beginning in President Dwight D. Eisenhower’s term, air traffic control crews used the call sign “Air Force One” to designate the plane used to transport government officials. The name stuck after the government ordered two Boeing 707-320B airframes to be adapted specifically for use by President John F. Kennedy. To this day, Boeing jets are the official transport of the U.S. president.

Ultimately, the 707 became the standard for all passenger jets and the forerunner of more than 14,000 Boeing commercial jets built since its debut.

“They kind of got it right the first time around at Boeing with the 707,” said author Sam Howe Verhovek. “If you think about it, we’re not really flying any faster today or more comfortably than when the Boeing 707 first took off.”

The company had a winner in the 707 and was amenable to adapting the airliner to carrier wishes. When Qantas, Australia’s largest airline and a longtime purchaser of Douglas planes, needed a jet with greater range than the conventional 707-120, Boeing’s engineers shortened the fuselage by 10 feet, giving the jet greater fuel efficiency. Qantas purchased 13 of the unique 707-138s.

As in the past, industry competition spurred many aircraft advancements that, in turn, led to other technological achievements. When the 707’s success spurred Douglas and other manufacturers to switch to jet-driven planes, their respective expertise and ingenuity would advance Boeing’s own research and development.

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