Clipper, Vol. 14, No. 3, March 1957

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VOL 14, No. 3
MIAMI, FLORIDA, MARCH 1957
570304
Nassau Welcomes First New York Flight
New Business Is Theme of Houston Meet
Drescher Predicts Bright Future For Nassau-N. Y. Route
Sales campaigns to attract new passenger and cargo business will highlight the Latin American Division’s efforts to achieve increased revenue during 1957.
How to generate this new business provided the theme for the recent Pan American World Airways regional management conference at Houston.
Edwin Drescher, Division manager, pointed to the new New York-Nassau service as another revenue source and said he expected the route to transport 50,-OOO^passengers during the first year of operation.
Drescher said the San Juan-Madrid route, sought by PAA also, would prove profitable and expressed disappointment that the Civil Aeronautics Board examiner had ruled against PAA’s application. He added, however, that he had hopes the Board will overrule the examiner.
Lists Travel Types
Three types of travel were listed by Juan Homs, sales manager, as those which will receive special attention in 1957. These are conventions and special events, groups, and incentive contest winners.
Homs said sales representatives also will make special efforts to stimulate and develop a desire to travel on the part of those who can afford to do so but remain at home. There will be special emphasis directed toward creating
Plaques Awarded For Sales Record
Plaques for the year’s best sales records in the Universal Air Travel Plan were awarded to Guatemala City and San Sal-valor stations at the Western Sector’s regional management conference, at Houston.
Edwin Drescher, LAD manager, made the presentations to Jay Wilson, director and DT/-SM at Guatemala, and Jim Schutt DT/SM at Salvador.
Another plaque in recognition of outstanding station training went to New Orleans and was accepted by John A. Parks, station manager.
travel among groups bound together by some common interest such as religion, education, farming, ranching, medicine, and industry, he added.
Speaking along the same lines, Mario Martinez, Division traffic and sales manager, said that PAA’s group movement of sales incentive vacationists and specialized groups has opened a new field of airline revenue.
Cites Potential
Martinez declared the potential in these fields as a revenue producer has barely been scratched and explained that rapidly increasing hotel facilities in Latin America and the Caribbean area are opening the gates wider for more group and sales incentive traveling.
He called upon those who might be involved in any way with group travel movements to provide the best possible service since such travel is likely to turn into repeat Continued on page 7
Inaugural Flight of PAA’s N.Y.-Nassau Route Arrives
. . . Nassau Firemen's Band Serenades Clipper Passengers
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Brazil Awards Dumont Medal To Vice President Toomey
PAA Is Training
Panama Guardsmen
A training course covering operation of commercial airlines is being
The Santos Dumont Silver Medal of Merit has been awarded by the Brazilian Government to Humphrey W. Toomey, Pan American World Airways vice president, with headquarters in Rio de Janeiro, in a ceremony in which a
number of top Brazilian officials*»-------------------------------
were honored for outstanding services to the nation’s aviation devel-
opment.
The presentations took place at Rio during observance of Santos Dumont Year, honoring Brazil’s pioneer aviator. Toomey received his medal from Major General Antonio Appel Netto, representing the Brazilian Minister of Aeronautics.
Receiving the honors with Toomey were former Senator Assis Chateaubriand, newly appointed ambassador to the Court of St. James at London; Dr. Manoel Gui-maraes, chairman of the board of Panair do Brazil; Dr. Cesar Pires de Mello, director-superintendent of Panair do Brazil, and Dr. Ilde-fonso Mascarenhas, a director of Panair.
It was the fourth honor the Brazilian Government had bestowed on Toomey for outstanding contributions to aviation development in that country. The other awards are the Knight of the Order of Aeronautics Merit, 1948; Great Officer of the Sovereign Order of Vera Cruz, 1956, and the Order of Dona Leopoldina, 1957.
Toomney first moved to Brazil in 1944 as regional director for Brazil, Argentina, Uruguay and Paraguay. From 1946 until 1952 he was manager of Pan American’s Latin American Division with headquarters at Miami, Florida, and on December 1, 1952, was elected vice president with his office in Rio.
He was born in Deer Lodge, Montana, and attended the College of Montana. He was graduated from the U.S. Naval Academy at Annapolis in 1922, and won his wings as a Navy pilot at Pensacola, Florida, in 1924.	<j>-
conducted for members of the Panama National Guard, by Pan American. The instruction was requested by the commander of the National Guard through Captain Torrijos, of the Tocumen detachment.
The classes have averaged 24 students, twice a week since the beginning of January. The object is to familiarize students with the functions of airlines at Tocumen, airline names and abréviations, simple codes, routing, flight numbers, treatment of passengers and the meaning of aviation.
The Panama National Guard is a combination of Army and police force. Interest in the course is high among those taking it and others scheduled for later classes.
Traffic Shows Gain In Central America
Passengers handled by Pan American World Airways at Panama and two Central American capitals—San Jose and Guatemala City — showed increases ranging upward to 36 per cent in 1956.
Panama’s Tocumen airport recorded 116,007 passengers, an increase of 15,251 or 15 per cent over 1955.
Largest passenger percentage increase was recorded at the Costa Rican capital where passengers arriving or departing totaled 27,-203, a 36 per cent increase over 1955’s 20,020.
Guatemala City’s passenger count was 63,195, an increase of 11,412, or 22 per cent over last year.
DECORATED—Vice President Humphrey W. Toomey, center, with Manuel Ferreira Guimaraes, left, chairman of the board of Panair do Brasil, and Senator Assis Chateaubriand, Brazilian publisher, right, at ceremonies in Rio de Janeiro at which they were presented the Santos Dumont Medal of Merit by the Brazilian government.
Officials Meet PAA Clipper At Oakes Field
Morrison Expects 50,000 Passengers During First Year
Nassau’s traditional British Colonial staidness gave way to raucous fanfare as top Bahamian government officials and residents turned out to welcome the Pan American World Airways Clipper inaugurating the New York-Nassau service.
As the Clipper’s engines were cut in front of the PAA terminal, the island’s 24-piece police band blared forth with martial music, then as the passengers dis-embarked after being cleared aboard by customs the band switched to calypso numbers.
Morrison is Speaker
Stafford L. Sands, chairman of the Bahamas Development Board, welcomed the new service and Clipper passengers. Wilbur L. Morrison, PAA executive vice president in charge of the Latin American Division, in a talk carried on the Nassau government radio, expressed confidence that Nassau and PAA would continue to grow together.
Morison said he expected PAA to carry 50,000 passengers on the route during the first year. In closing he presented to Sands a model of the DC-7B type Clipper making the first flight.
Sands then named pretty June Lundi, an inaugural flight passenger who is Miss New York Press Photographer, as “Miss Nassau.” Ten Years of Effort
The new route, authorized by the Civil Aeronautics Board (CAB) and approved by President Eisen-Continued on Page 7
More Service To SJU Sought
Pan American World Airways has sought permission from the Civil Aeronautics Board to give additional passenger and cargo service to Puerto Rico by adding direct flights from Boston, Philadelphia, Baltimore and Washington to its present New York service.
In a brief to CAB Chief Examiner Francis W. Brown, the airline asserted that flights from these cities would fully meet the need for additional service between Puerto Rico and the mainland. It also pointed out that if such flights are operated by Pan American, they would provide new and improved service between these important cities and South America and other Caribbean areas, increasing San Juan’s importance as a crossroads even more.
In discussing the proposed new service from Boston, Philadelphia, Baltimore and Washington, Pan American stated that it would operate daily service from each of these cities to San Juan and that three flights a week from each of these cities would continue beyond San Juan to other Caribbean islands, to Caracas, and down the east coast of South America to Brazil and Argentina.