That was the soundtrack to a 1972 television ad for the now defunct National Airlines. Not much subtle about it, was there. The ad featured a series of young attractive women beckoning passengers to come on and fly me.
From the beginning of commercial air travel in this country, airlines featured attractive women as hostesses in the sky, creating an inviting environment for the key demographic, the male business traveler.
While the image in popular culture was one of glamor, the reality of the job was that it was hard work with low pay. The requirements imposed by the airlines on the almost exclusively female flight attendants, or stewardesses as they were then called were breathtaking in their scope and sexism.
But over many years, the flight attendants banded together to fight for improved pay and working conditions. The story of that fight is laid out in Nell McShane Wulfhart’s new book, The Great Stewardess Rebellion: How Women Launched a Workplace Revolution at 30,000 Feet.
