Time Capsule #8: flying standby

(on airlines that no longer exist, in planes that no longer fly)

The 160 71s like me from west of the Mississippi mostly flew to and from Hanover. Well, not exactly Hanover, since the airport down in West Lebanon had only a few flights a day to Boston and NY. Some people drove their cars across the country in non-stop, coffee-fueled marathon trips with rotating drivers.

In those days, if you flew, you got a student standby ticket, which cost 50% of normal fare. The hidden cost of these bargain tickets was that you only got on the flight if the plane had an empty seat.

That wasn't as big a problem as it would be today, since few flights 55 years ago were fully booked. In my four years of flying from Boston to San Antonio and Seattle, I think I made every flight.

The scene at the big airports was what was called back then a 'happening.' There were always other students hanging out at the gates waiting for their names to be called. I met some far-out people in those waiting zones.

Members of the military had standby tickets, too, and they had priority for empty seats. Flying to San Antonio meant that there were plenty of Army soldiers headed to Ft. Sam Houston. I remember one red-eye NY-San Antonio flight in which the dozen passengers were just students and soldiers. The flight attendants let us all sit together in the front of the 727, and a girl from Austin pulled out a guitar and did Judy Collins songs while we smoked cigarettes and enjoyed a round of free drinks that the 'stewardesses' accounted for as First Class Complimentary. It was groovy, man.

It didn't last. Once you turned 22, you weren't eligible anyway, and the Student Standby fares were discontinued in 1972. Now flights are all full --or overbooked. I can't remember the last time I enjoyed sitting next to an empty seat.

Those 727s, with their weird rear door and airstairs, like the one D.B. Cooper parachuted out of over the Oregon Siskiyous, were gradually taken out of service.

The jet bridge was already being installed in airports, and pretty soon you wouldn't walk across the tarmac to board the plane via rolling stairways, Casablanca- or POTUS-style.

The airlines themselves didn't last either. The ones I flew on, Braniff, Eastern, Pan Am, TWA, Northwest, Continental, and Trans Texas, have all disappeared via merger or financial collapse.

Braniff was cool with the bright colors of the interiors and the Pucci outfits of the hip flight attendants.

Flying ain't what it used to be.

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