Clipper, Vol. 6, No. 9, October 1949

              We don’t need scissors to help cut costs—just “sheer” common sense.
Pan American Worid Airways
LATIN AMERICAN DIVISION
UPPER
Let’s all cooperate to make Clipper departure time mean “on time.”
VOL. 6—No. 9
OCTOBER, 1949
491021
Robert Lockhart New Chief Of LAD Communications
Robert Lockhart, Jr., who started with PAA as a radio operator 13 years ago, has been promoted to LAD communications superintendent.
He succeeds Robert J. Gleason, who resigned to become vice president in charge of operations of Aeronautical Radio, Inc., Washington, D. C., a unified communications system that serves approximately 60 airlines.
Since joining PAA Lockhart has served in posts around the world. Nine months after he was employed as a ground radio operator in San Francisco, he was transferred to Guam. Subsequently he was sent to Macao, the Portuguese
NEW ASSISTANT
Close on the heels of the promotion of Robert Lockhart, Jr., to the post of superintendent of LAD communications came the announcement of the arrival October 13 of an “assistant” for him. The new “assistant” was a son born to Mrs. Lockhart, the former Miss Ruth Jones of Miami, in Jackson Memorial Hospital, Miami. This is the first child for Lockhart and his wife, a former major in the Army Nurse Corps.
colony on the China coast near Hong Kong.
Then came a year in Manila and more “home” duty in San Francisco, after which Lockhart became a flight radio operator aboard the famous Clipper flying boats then crossing the Pacific.
After another period in San Francisco as a combined operator and radio mechanic, Lockhart was sent to Brownsville, Texas, in January, 1942, to assist in installing radio stations throughout Central America, Colombia and Venezuela
Robert Lockhart, Jr.
as part of the wartime airport development program.
Transferred to Miami in 1944, Lockhart moved steadily up from ground radio engineer to maintenance supervisor and then assistant division communications superintendent.
After a year in New York as assistant to the communications superintendent, he returned to Miami in the same capacity, holding that post until his present promotion.
Born in Huntington Park, Calif., Lockhart went to high school there, then attended San Bernardino Junior College and took night courses at the University of California at Berkeley.
An amateur radio operator at the age of 12, he was a radio technician and announcer for Station KFXM in San Bernardino while in his ’teens.' He was a radio operator for Western Air Express and American Airlines before joining PAA.
Unlike many communications experts, Lockhart’s hobby is not tinkering with an amateur radio set in his home. He prefers optics, and spends hours in his home shop in the painstaking precision work of grinding lenses and parabolic mirrors for telescopes.
— Conservation Cuts Costs —
Annual Drive Under Way To Aid Community Chest
The importance of all Miami-based personnel doing everything they can to help make a success of the 1950 fund solicitation campaign of the Dade County Community Chest was stressed by the Employes’ Committee and by Humphrey W. Toomey, LAD manager, as the first shot in the opening of the drive among LAD employes.
“Each of us should fulfill the obligations of a good neighbor in the community of Miami,”, said Mr. Toomey.
“The poor, the homeless, the sick —the youth who need help—are present in every community. Here in Miami the Community Chest of Dade County provides a convenient and efficient way to contribute toward our common welfare.
“The Chest itself, as I am sure you know, is simply an agency to collect and administer funds for the 21 worthy organizations which do the welfare job here.”
This year’s fund raising cam^ paign among PAA employes extends from October 24 through October 31, with George Gwin, of the industrial relations department, serving as company chairman, and Edward Weissinger, also of industrial relations, as plant drive chairman.
Gwin said the payroll deduction system would be available again, except that this year the deductions may be spread over a longer period instead of an employe’s donation being taken out of one paycheck.
On the other hand, an employe may make his contribution in cash without having paycheck deductions, if he prefers it that way.
Captains have been appointed to direct the fund drive in each department and pledge cards have been distributed on which employes are to record the sums they intend to donate.
— Conservation Cuts Costs —
Rare Drug Flown To Aid Venezuelan
In response to a plea from a Venezuelan for a rare drug needed by his wife, PAA officials were busy one day recently acting as both purchasing agents and shippers.
A request for two grams of succus cineraria maritima was received at PAA’s office in Caracas from Dr. Nelson Davila Aguidera of Barquisameto, Venezuela, whose wife has a serious eye ailment.
There was none of the drug in Caracas, so the request was radioed to LAD officials in Miami, who tried without success to find it. They in turn relayed the plea to PAA headquarters In New York, which had better luck.
The drug was flown by Clipper direct from New York and arrived in Caracas the next morning.
WHA’ HOPPENED?
Hello . . .
It looks a little different, doesn’t it—The Clipper, we mean?
Don’t start thinking you must have picked up the wrong paper, however, because it really still is your same old LAD Clipper. It has just grown a little and put on a new “dress.”
That means there’s more room in it for additional news for and about you and your fellow LAD workers.
We hope you like it. If you don’t, please let us know. On the other hand, if you do like it, please let us know that, too.
PAA Club Winner Of Plaque Award
Presentation of a plaque awarded by the National Association of Foremen for activities of the Miami PAA Management Club during 1948 highlighted a dinner meeting of the club at the Columbus Hotel in Miami October 6.
The PAA group won the plaque in competition with 27 other similar organizations in the NAF’s Zone E, which embodies Southeastern United States—Kentucky, Tennessee, Mississippi, Alabama, North and South Carolina, Georgia and Florida.
In winning the award, which was decided upon at the NAF’s national convention at Detroit in September, the PAA club ranked fourth nationally.
Presentation of the plaque was made by John J. Tigert, component overhaul superintendent at Miami, who, with William S. Saltz, past president of the club, attended the NAF convention. Saltz, inventory control supervisor, gave a report of the convention to his fellow club members.
Principal speaker for the meeting was John B. Robinson, tool engineer for Thompson Products, Inc., Cleveland, Ohio. His topic was “The Power of Positive Thought.”
— Conservation Cuts Costs —
Toomey Visions Jet Liners As Panama Dedicates Field
Jet airliners will soon be flying the 1,166 miles between Miami and Panama in about two hours, Humphrey W. Toomey, LAD manager, believes.
Mr. Toomey made this prediction at Tocumen, Panama’s new National Airport, during ceremonies September 20 marking the transfer of commercial aviation activities on the Isthmus from Albrook Field, Canal Zone, to Tocumen.
Jet transports will be the third major development in intercontinental aviation, he said. The first was the debut of amphibious planes, which PAA helped develop and was the first to u^e on flights between the Americas, he recalled.
The second major step, he continued, was the construction of airfields large enough to accommodate intercontinental land-planes.
“Pan American pioneered here, too, building its own airfields in many cases,” Mr. Toomey said. “During this stage, PAA was able to cut flying time between Panama and Miami from the three days required 20 years ago to four and one-half hours.
“A third and even more dramatic stage is being ushered in now with the development of the jet airliner. In the next few years, jet airliners will be streaking through the skies between Miami and Panama. They would be landing at this airport only about two hours after leaving the United States.”
Pan American, in keeping with its policy of providing the best in new airliners when available, is investigating jet airliners now being built, Mr. Toomey said.
“Airline speeds of 550 miles an hour will be commonplace in the next few years,” he said.
Top-ranking officials of the Isthmus, including the president of Panama and the governor of the Canal Zone, participated in the Tocumen ceremonies, which preceded by a few hours the actual removal of all Pan American facilities from Albrook to Tocumen on September 21 and the first
scheduled flights to and from the huge new airport by PAA’s Clippers, which have served the Isthmus for more than 20 years.
The Clipper Panama, one of. PAA’s new 300-mile-an-hour Con-vair-type Clippers, whisked the official party from Albrook to Tocumen— a distance of about 15 miles—after giving the group a bird’s-eye view of the Pacific end of the Panama Canal.
Although Tocumen’s administration building, which will house the passenger terminal, is not completed, comfortable temporary quarters for air travelers have been fitted up in the future cargo terminal. The main hangar and two nose hangars are in use. The
SOLD FIRST TICKET
The man who sold the first Clipper ticket from Panama to New York still is working for PAA as station manager at Corpus Christi.
Claude P. Hilliard was a dairy manager in Florida in 1930 when he took a vacation in Panama and — falling in love with the country — joined the then infant PAA as a ticket agent in Cristobal. He still remembers the thrill of selling a ticket to the first passenger from Panama north to the States on one of the early Sikorsky - type Clipper flying boats.
runway was opened to traffic in August, 1947.
Two of PAA’s affiliates, Com-pania Panamenia de Aviacion (COPA), a domestic airline in Panama, and Aerovias Nacionales de Colombia (AVIANCA), have been using Tocumen for more than a year.
Panama spared no expense in making Tocumen one of the most modern airports in existence. Its 7,000-foot concrete runway, 200 feet wide, can accommodate not only the largest of present-day aircraft, but those of the forseeable future.
— Conservation Cuts Costs —
Double-Decker Rests In 'Drydock*
Here is a view of one of PAA’s giant double-deck Clippers “at ease” in the world’s largest airplane service dock at the Miami Overhaul Base. The 75-ton dock is an intricate scaffold-like framework of welded steel tubing and trusses. Fabricated in five major sections, the movable dock is rolled into position after the Clippers have been towed into the hangar. Incidentally, the tails of these huge 75-passenger double-deckers are too high to enter most hangar doors, so they are hinged in the middle and folded down when these Clippers enter and leave the dock. (Story on Page 4)