Glamour, danger, liberation: in a Mad Men-era of commercial flight,
Pan Am World Airways attracted the kind of young woman who wanted out,
and wanted up
Required to have a college education, speak two languages, and possess
the political savvy of a Foreign Service officer, a jet-age stewardess
serving on iconic Pan Am between 1966 and 1975 also had to be between
5′3" and 5′9", between 105 and 140 pounds, and under 26 years of age at
the time of hire.Cooke's intimate storytelling weaves together the
real-life stories of a memorable cast of characters, from small-town
girl Lynne Totten, a science major who decided life in a lab was not for
her, to Hazel Bowie, one of the relatively few Black stewardesses of the
era, as they embraced the liberation of their new jet-set life. Cooke
brings to light the story of Pan Am stewardesses' role in the Vietnam
War, as the airline added runs from Saigon to Hong Kong for planeloads
of weary young soldiers straight from the battlefields, who were off for
five days of R&R, and then flown back to war. Finally, with Operation
Babylift--the dramatic evacuation of 2,000 children during the fall of
Saigon--the book's special cast of stewardesses unites to play an
extraordinary role on the world stage.
