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MANAGEMENT GIANT
Juan Terry Trippe
Timeline
1899 Born. 1922 Graduates from Yale University. 1923 Founds Long Island Airways. 1925 Founds Colonial Air Transport. 1927 Forms Pan American Airways. 1928 Expands routes into Central and South America. 1935 Launches Clipper flying boat service. 1936 First U.S. commercial service to the Orient. 1939 First scheduled transatlantic flight. 1947 Pan Am plane makes first scheduled around-the-world commercial flight. 1952 Introduces cut-price tourist fares. 1958 First transatlantic jet service. 1981 Dies.

Summary
Juan Trippe (18991981), the U.S. airman, started flying as a teenager but could never have imagined the impact he was to have on world travel and commercial flight. After a stint as a pilot with the U.S. Navy during World War I, Trippe abandoned a career in finance for the excitement of the skies. He started with Long Island Airways in 1923, but his career really took off when he founded Pan Am in 1927. The airline soared to success, achieving one first after another: the first transpacific commercial flight in 1935; the first transatlantic commercial flight in 1939; the first commercial round-the-world flight in 1947. Pan Am, with Trippe as president, was the first commercial airline to embrace the jet aircraft, and helped to establish the reputation of the Boeing corporation. Trippe cleverly steered Pan Am on a course that made it one of the worlds leading airlines for much of the 20th century.

Background and Rise

Born in Seabright, New Jersey, in June 1899, Trippe was involved in aviation from an early age. Still in his teens, he flew with the U.S. Navy during World War I. After the war he returned to his education, graduating from Yale and entering a career in

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investment banking. He tried to settle into his new career but found the world of finance dull. The lure of the skies proved too great, and in 1923 Trippe established his first company, Long Island Airways. This company was superseded by Colonial Air Transport in 1925 with Trippe as its first managing director. His greatest achievement at Colonial was to win the first domestic airmail route awarded by the Federal government. The route connected Boston, Hartford, and New York. Trippe had bold plans for Colonial. He proposed expanding the airlines operations to the West Coast and out to the Caribbean. The stockholders, more cautious in their outlook, refused to accede to Trippes requests. Sensing that he would be unable to realize his ambitions, Trippe left Colonial, taking many of the pilots with him. Once again he made a fresh start founding a new airline, Pan American Airways.

Defining Moments
Trippe secured an early coup at Pan Am when the new airline was awarded the United StatesCuba mail contract. Delighted though he was to win the contract, it presented certain logistical problems. To fulfill the contract terms Pan Am had to fly the route by October 19, 1927. The F-7 aircraft Pan Am was intending to use on the route had yet to be delivered. And it wasnt due until the beginning of October at the earliest. Reluctant to risk losing such an important contract, Trippe chartered a West Indian Aerial Express Fairchild for $145.50. Even then it was a close-run thing. The FloridaCuba service began on October 18, flying from Key West to Havana. At the beginning of 1928 Trippe went one step further. On January 16 a Pan Am Fokker F-7 took off from Key West with seven passengers and flew the 90 miles to Cuba. It was the first scheduled commercial passenger service under a U.S. flag. Trippe didnt stop at Cuba. South America was one target destination; in particular Trippe had his eye on the Buenos Aires routes. The difficulty was that the routes were owned by another airline, Grace Airways. Trippe made a deal with W. R Grace creating a new airline, PANAGRA, Pan American Grace Airways. PANAGRA served South America from the West Coast until 1968. Pan Am continued to grow under Trippes stewardship. It also continued to out-innovate its competitors. Two-way radios, multiengine landplanes, onboard navigators, cabin crew, in-flight meals, railroad connecting services, and flying boats all enabled Pan Am to remain ahead of its rivals. As well as refining the service Trippe pushed forward the boundaries of technology by pioneering longer and more adventurous routes. In 1935 a Pan Am clipper, the Philippine, carrying 15 passengers, flew from San Francisco to Hong Kong establishing the first transpacific commercial route between North America and Asia. At the time this was generally regarded as impossible. It was followed in turn by the first scheduled transatlantic flight in 1939, from New York to Lisbon and then on to Marseilles. In 1941 a clipper flew an unscheduled trip around the world making 18 stops in 12 countries on the way. When the Japanese entered World War II at the end of 1941, some of Pan Ams clippers in the Pacific were destroyed. Pan Am helped the U.S. war effort by transporting troops

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and equipment to the war zones using Boeing 314s. The airline also played a key role in the development of the atomic bomb by transporting uranium for the Manhattan Project. After the war, in 1947, Trippe introduced the first commercial around-the-world air trip. A Lockheed 049 left New York carrying 20 passengers and arrived in San Francisco 12 days and 20,000 miles later. Trippe continued to push the bounds of commercial flight technology. In 1955 he acknowledged the potential of jet aircraft to change commercial airlines. This is the most important aviation development since Lindberghs flight. In one fell swoop, we have shrunken the earth, he said at the time. Within three years Pan Am jet aircraft were flying across the Atlantic. A good example of Trippes rush to embrace technology came in the 1960s. In December 1968, with the Apollo 8 mission underway, Trippe phoned ABC-TV to make an offer to the public. Pan Am would be taking bookings for the first scheduled moon flights, Trippe announced. It was a stroke of marketing genius. Pan Am was deluged with inquiries and established the First Moon Flights Club. When the list was finally closed in 1971 the list numbered 93,000, including one future president, Ronald Reagan. At the beginning of 1980, Pan Am merged with National Airlines. Shortly after, in 1981, Trippe died. After his death Pan Am struggled to survive in a global economic downturn, ultimately filing for bankruptcy in 1991. In another twist to the Pan Am saga, the famous blue globe logo returned to the skies in October 1999 when Guildford Transportation revived the company and started a domestic passenger service from Portsmouth, New Hampshire, to Sanford, Florida.

Context and Conclusions

When Juan Trippe started his first fledgling airline, commercial flight was in its infancy. By the time he retired, Pan Am Airways served 85 nations on six continents. Trippe, together with a handful of aviators, is largely responsible for popularizing a form of transportation that people the world over now take for granted. Through a combination of sheer doggedness and a spirit of adventure, he made Pan Am into one of the greatest airlines of the last century. It took a flyer to start up an airline, a man who could command the respect of his pilots and get his hands dirty with engine oil if required. Trippe was an aviator first and a businessman second, and it is a remarkable testament to his talents that he managed to make the transition from the hands-on management of a small commercial aviation operation to the general management of one of the worlds largest passenger airlines.

For More Information

Books:
Bender, Marylin, and Selig Altschul. Chosen Instrument: Pan Am, Juan Trippe, the Rise and Fall of an American Entrepreneur. New York: Simon and Schuster, 1982. Daley, Robert. An American Saga: Juan Trippe and his Pan Am Empire. New York: Random House, 1980.

Web site:
Pan American Airways: www.flypanam.com

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