Mohawk Airlines, 1958
In the U.S diversity among its flight attendants had been a Pan Am goal for years before it actually happened. Different types of smiling, helpful women were desirable, to reinforce the image of a global airline. In 1955 Pan Am hired Japanese -American women based in Honolulu because they spoke Japanese on Pacific routes. Pan Am also hoped that these women might entertain male passengers like geisha-girls.
Airline executives acknowledged they’d lose their market share if Black women served mostly White passengers. And that White flight attendant numbers might dwindle if the job’s glamour was down-graded by employing Negro girls!
Black civil rights were limited in U.S in the 1950s. In any case, racial prejudice was not the only thing hindering hopeful stewardesses. Weight, height, appearance, marital status and age all influenced a woman’s career.
On Wing Tips’ magazine cover, three women displayed new uniform options: a blond, an Asian and an African-American. At Pan Am in the 1950s-early 1960s Black women attended stewardess-training courses that prepared them for successful interviews. But the Black graduates still had to watch their White peers receive offers from small airlines that visited the schools.
In 1957 African-American Ruth Taylor considered becoming a stewardess. She interviewed with US major Trans World Airlines but failed because of her colour. An angry Taylor filed a complaint against TWA with N.Y’s State Commission of Discrimination. No action was brought against TWA, but other companies began to re-think their minority hiring practices.
The first was Mid-Atlantic carrier Mohawk Airlines. Of the 800 Black applicants who applied, only Ruth Taylor succeeded. By 1958 Taylor started working in the small airline, at a critical moment in U.S civil aviation history! Note another absurd regulation that led to Taylor’s sacking THAT YEAR i.e married women were forbidden by all carriers in the 50s and 60s! Her career was brief, but it had been a significant victory in the fight for American Black civil rights.
3 months later, facing Taylor’s discrimination lawsuit, TWA reversed its own policies and hired Margaret Grant, the first African American flight attendant for a major U.S airline. Unfortunately she was sacked due to illness.
in Capital Airlines uniform
Although Ruth Taylor and Margaret Grant’s hard-fought victories counted, progress was slow. Only in 1960 did Capital Airlines hire Patricia Banks. She’d applied 4 years earlier and had fared well in their initial screening, but the airline hadn’t employed her without specifying why. A public hearing ruled that Capital discriminated against Banks because of her race; her employment was ordered by the N.Y State Commission Against Discrimination .
Even when African-American women finally began flying with the major airlines, they still struggled. In 1962 Northwest Airlines employed Marlene White, who had done very well in the training, but claimed that the carrier had singled her out for degrading treatment. She was reinstated only after filing a case.
NAACP lawyers prosecuted cases on behalf of qualified Black graduates who earned flight attendant jobs. As lawsuits started in courts everywhere, evidence of racial bias against African-American women appeared on news-papers nationwide. In time, each student flight attendant won her case. In 1962 one of those plaintiffs appeared on Jet Magazine in a Northwest Airlines uniform. A 1963 Ebony headline shouted “Open Skies for Negro Girls!” A Black newspaper The Chicago Defender praised American Airlines for promoting its first Black flight stewardess to supervisor; the Southern Christian Leadership Conference organised a boycott against Delta, whose numbers of Black employees stagnated.
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Today air crews work together to ensure the travellers’ safety and comfort. Unfortunately it took 50 years after Taylor’s first flight for HER achievement to be publicly recognised in 2008.
In Australia, equality was even slower. After the 1967 Referendum, where 90+% of citizens voted to have Indigenous Australians included in the national census (sic), there were attempts to actively promote opportunities for Indigenous Australians.
The Department of Labour and Industry published information about the duties of air hostesses in Dawn: A Magazine for the Aboriginal People of NSW (June 1968). They wrote work is often tiring and the hostess must be of first-class health. She must speak clearly, have good eyesight, a pleasing appearance and personality, and an ability to get on well with people. Many hostesses were giving up their jobs because their health was suffering from medical conditions associated with flying and from exhaustion, they warned. But why was this advice in an Aboriginal magazine?
Laurel Russ was the first Aboriginal airhostess who flew with East-West Airlines in 1966, the country link for Ansett Airlines. [Later she graduated Law, worked with the Legal Aid Commission and then headed the Aboriginal Unit of the NSW Ombudsman’s office]. Sue Bryant, another Indigenous Australian air hostess, started working for Ansett in 1970.
Under the new National Employment Strategy for Aboriginals, airline company TAA and the Department of Aboriginal Affairs undertook a recruitment drive to find suitable Aboriginal hostesses. 3 attractive Aboriginal girls (sic) graduated as air hostesses for the government airline TAA. They were Mary Cross from Shark Bay fishing village in W.A, Jennifer Patterson from the Qld Health Dept Townsville and Evelyn Schaber was from the Central Land Council at Alice Springs. Were they the only Aboriginal air hostesses working in Australia? The 3 graduated with 16 other beautiful and intelligent Australians (sic). The three girls applied for an air hostess job because they saw their jobs as being public relations officers, for their people. TAA’s chairman hoped the three girls would be the forerunners of more Aboriginal TAA hostesses.
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Since 1994 Qantas has been very proud to bring Aboriginal & Torres Strait Islander culture to the world. Qantas
NAACP lawyers prosecuted cases on behalf of qualified Black graduates who earned flight attendant jobs. As lawsuits started in courts everywhere, evidence of racial bias against African-American women appeared on news-papers nationwide. In time, each student flight attendant won her case. In 1962 one of those plaintiffs appeared on Jet Magazine in a Northwest Airlines uniform. A 1963 Ebony headline shouted “Open Skies for Negro Girls!” A Black newspaper The Chicago Defender praised American Airlines for promoting its first Black flight stewardess to supervisor; the Southern Christian Leadership Conference organised a boycott against Delta, whose numbers of Black employees stagnated.
a successful plaintiff appeared on Jet Magazine cover
in a Northwest Airlines uniform, 1962
By 1965, African-American women worked as flight attendants for all airlines. Pan Am alone employed c100 Black women, and though the airline hoped to hire more, recruitment stalled. So a group of former Pan Am flight attendants, The Blackbirds, told their stories on radio and on panels. And Delta flight attendant Casey Grant’s Stars in the Sky told of the Black pioneers’ personal experiences.
Today air crews work together to ensure the travellers’ safety and comfort. Unfortunately it took 50 years after Taylor’s first flight for HER achievement to be publicly recognised in 2008.
In Australia, equality was even slower. After the 1967 Referendum, where 90+% of citizens voted to have Indigenous Australians included in the national census (sic), there were attempts to actively promote opportunities for Indigenous Australians.
The Department of Labour and Industry published information about the duties of air hostesses in Dawn: A Magazine for the Aboriginal People of NSW (June 1968). They wrote work is often tiring and the hostess must be of first-class health. She must speak clearly, have good eyesight, a pleasing appearance and personality, and an ability to get on well with people. Many hostesses were giving up their jobs because their health was suffering from medical conditions associated with flying and from exhaustion, they warned. But why was this advice in an Aboriginal magazine?
Laurel Russ was the first Aboriginal airhostess who flew with East-West Airlines in 1966, the country link for Ansett Airlines. [Later she graduated Law, worked with the Legal Aid Commission and then headed the Aboriginal Unit of the NSW Ombudsman’s office]. Sue Bryant, another Indigenous Australian air hostess, started working for Ansett in 1970.
Under the new National Employment Strategy for Aboriginals, airline company TAA and the Department of Aboriginal Affairs undertook a recruitment drive to find suitable Aboriginal hostesses. 3 attractive Aboriginal girls (sic) graduated as air hostesses for the government airline TAA. They were Mary Cross from Shark Bay fishing village in W.A, Jennifer Patterson from the Qld Health Dept Townsville and Evelyn Schaber was from the Central Land Council at Alice Springs. Were they the only Aboriginal air hostesses working in Australia? The 3 graduated with 16 other beautiful and intelligent Australians (sic). The three girls applied for an air hostess job because they saw their jobs as being public relations officers, for their people. TAA’s chairman hoped the three girls would be the forerunners of more Aboriginal TAA hostesses.
