Museum Newsletter

Board of Directors

Pam Blaschum-Director

Karen Holden Young-Early History

Ann Noland-Volunteer Coordinator

Nancy Sitzmann-Event Coordinator

Mary Ellen Miller-Board Member

Chris Funk-Board Member

Carol Emert-Board Member/Archivist

Christopher Nold-Simulator Operator

Sheila Thomson-Committee Member

Dianne Marks-Creative Consultant

Volunteers

Zana Allen

Joe Ballweg

Carol & Dean Connor

Cyrus Devry

Keith Epperson

Donna Gentry

Alan Hartmann

Jim Lawlor

Bill Leonard

Larry & Marcia Lillge

Art Lujin

John Mays

Raymond Rowe

Frank Ruege

Bob Schlueter

Charlie Sheldon

Judy Shenefield

Dominique Spini

Alice Wasko

Lee Wilhite

Donna Wilkins

TWA Museum

10 Richards Road

Kansas City, MO 64116

816-234-1011

twamuseum@gmail.com

From the Director Pam Blaschum. . .

The second quarter has been a good one for the Museum! Our 1940’s Hangar Dance on April 26th was a successful fund raising event! We had 300 in attendance and featured the Moonlight Serenade Orchestra. Many of our guests came in military attire and 40’s vintage clothing. (Pictured right are Ruth Richter Holden & Burt Jolley.)

The biggest surprise was the arrival of Ruth Richter Holden’s 1937 Lockheed Electra 12 A Junior in TWA livery. (More about this amaz-ing story on page 3.) The Commemorative Air Force also provided a Fairchild PT-19. These antique aircraft provided a great background for the orchestra! (Pictured below is a night of dancing with “Ellie” in the background.)

The evening prior to the dance we had a small recep-tion in the Lindbergh Con-ference room and a dedica-tion of the Main Gallery to Marie and Leo Trainer. In attendance were Betty Sop-er, Martha Noland and Di-anne Pepper from the Platte County Historical Society. These three were instru-mental in keeping our collec-tion intact while we were a chapter of PCHS from 1985-2013. We are now our own 501 C 3 non-profit organiza-tion. (Pictured left are Marie Trainer and Ruth Richter Holden)

July 2014

By Carol Emert

“When any historical object enters a museum, it must be identified by some clear and ready means and its entry and subsequent disposition must be accurately and per-manently recorded.” This last sentence is a quote from a book titled Museum Registrations Methods, which was printed by the American Association of Museums some years back, and contains the proce-dures by which museum staff care for objects held in public trust.

Each and every object at the TWA Museum has special his-toric meaning, and to each object is attached a story of an employee who touched the airline in his or her own spe-cial way. It is the mission of the TWA Museum to guaran-tee that objects brought into the collection are cared for properly so that future gen-erations will know the story of TWA and its employees in aviation history.

Over the last ten months we have moved about 95% of the collection stored in one part of the building to larger and more permanent storage. As previously mentioned, we are separating objects into groups to determine what we have in our holdings, and to ear-mark objects, storage units, and equipment that we would like to acquire in the future. We are very close to being done with the first phase, and will begin inventorying and counting objects this summer once everything is in our permanent space. Once we have done that we will begin cataloging objects, photo-graphing them, and will give each object a tag with a series of numbers. The information will later be en-tered into the PastPerfect database.

In working through this process we are very fortu-nate to have two very talented volunteers assisting in this complicated task. Zana Allen and John Mays are extraordinary in their ability to think through the steps required in the process, and both have excellent abilities in the area of research.

The more we get into the TWA archives the more fascinating it all becomes. The stories that emerge are amazing. One thing is for sure, it is a pleasure to care for TWA’s proud history and we look forward to telling the stories in the future in our Museum displays.

Silver Wings International

We were pleased to be notified that we, along with the 800 Memorial in NY, will now be the charities of the Silver Wings International membership. Silver Wings Internation-al, Inc. was founded in 1987 by a group of retired TWA flight attendants to celebrate the pride and dignity of their chosen profession. The organization, which is open to former TWA and Ozark Flight Attendants, numbers over 950 members throughout the U.S., Canada, Mexico and Europe. Silver Wings and its members guaranteed a place in history for TWA through placement of vintage uniform collections at the Museum of Flight in Seattle, WA. and The TWA Museum in Kansas City. Uniforms are also placed by Lynne Adleman and the Los Angeles Chapter in the Los Angeles Flight Path Aviation Museum. The careers of our members span service aboard aircraft from the DC-3 to the B-717. We are proud to claim a member average of 30 years of service to TWA and Ozark Air-lines. Our Annual Convention and Gathering of Friends is held each fall in a variety of host cities. As we all experience the loss of the identity of our airline we worked for, along with separation from colleagues we have worked with, now, more than ever, is the time to pull together to protect our friendships and our mu-tual history with TWA.

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VOLUNTEER COMMITTEE REPORT

I would like to thank Karen Holden-Young for all her help this past quarter. Recently she has put together a list of Board Members and Volunteers with emails and phone numbers that will help greatly when emails are sent. It is a fact that without our wonderful volunteers this museum would not be able to function. They are a dedi-cated group of individuals who are knowledgeable and enthusiastic about the history of TWA and its place in commercial avia-tion. We thank all the volunteers for their time and talents. We are always looking for new volunteers so if anyone out there would like to come and be a part of our volunteer family, give the museum a call 816-234-1011 and we will get you started.

Ann Noland Volunteer Coordinator

September 27-TWA DCS

Alumni

Convention

October 18-1940’s Hangar Dance

The memory of Trans World Airlines is alive and well!

This is more than an article about an airplane. It is also a love story. It begins when Ruth Richter Holden was a child. Her father, Paul Richter Jr., was executive vice president of Trans World Airlines and one of its three founders. She grew up in Kansas City, Missouri, TWA's hometown, as an "airline brat" surrounded by TWA people and their airplanes.

Holden was enthralled by flight and became a TWA "hostess" in 1955, working the round-engine airliners of that era. She married in 1958. At that time management did not permit flight attendants to be married. She was forced to resign but even-tually returned to the sky as a pilot and now has 1,500 hours, an instrument rating, and a Piper Warrior.

Wanting to honor her legendary father, who died at 53 when she was a teenager, Holden created a Web site detailing his involvement with TWA. This Web site caught the attention of Ed and Connie Bowlin, who wanted to sell their Lockheed 12-A Electra Junior. The airplane had once been owned by TWA, and the couple had hoped that Holden could provide historical information that would help them to sell the airplane.

NC18137 was built in 1937 at Lockheed Aircraft's Burbank, California, factory and delivered new to Continental Airlines for use on its short, lean routes. Continental sold the airplane to Trans-continental and Western Air (later called Trans World Airlines) in 1940. The Electra Junior was operated by TWA from 1940 to 1945 as an executive transport and as an airborne research laboratory. It was used, for example, to develop static discharge wicks. At the end of WWII, TWA sold the Electra to the Texas Oil Company (Texaco).

Holden knew that TWA had owned only one Model 12A (TWA aircraft number 240), and the Bowlins' e-mail sent her scurrying to her father's stack of logbooks. There she verified that her father had taken her at the age of 10 on a flight from Kansas City to Washington, D.C., in that same airplane. That was on July 16, 1944. She also recalls having been flown in it two years earlier with TWA President and pilot Jack Frye.

During a subsequent telephone conversation with Connie Bowlin, Holden said matter of factly, "I don't know why I should help you to sell this airplane. I should be the one to buy it." She recalls thinking that she could not afford the airplane but simply had to have it. "You don't go looking for love; it finds you." Holden adds, "I purchased the airplane sight unseen in June 2005, even if it might have meant having to mortgage my home, sell my firstborn, and let the county bury me in a pauper's graveyard. I placed my faith in the ancient aviators who will help me to find a way to keep and fly “Ellie." (So named by Holden from the

initials of the Lockheed Electra.)

Holden had no buyer's remorse, even though she had no idea how she would get the aircraft from Griffin, Georgia, to her home in San Luis Obispo, California. She had nei-ther a taildragger endorsement nor a multiengine rating. Fortunately, she was able to sweet-talk her close friend Curt "Rocky" Walters, a retired captain for American Eagle, into going to Georgia with her and getting checked out in the airplane. Scott Nauman, current United Airlines Pilot, is pictured here with Captain Curt Walters,

Walters flew the airplane to California with Holden riding shotgun and grinning all the way. He, too, fell in love with the airplane and became Holden's partner in its purchase. They immediately began the process of restoring "old number 240" to its original condi-tion and TWA livery.

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First Board of Directors Meeting

May 17, 2014

The Museum had its first Board of Directors Meeting on May 17th. Our newest board member is Chris Funk! Chris is a welcome addi-tion to our newly formed board.

By Pam Blaschum

Many years ago I was working a Flt. From TPA to STL with continuing ser-vice to MCI. The flight was complete-ly full. The aircraft was a Boeing 727-231. In addition to all passengers seats being occupied, we also had a Flight Attendant on the jumpseat and a com-muting pilot riding in the cockpit. Shortly after takeoff, a woman sitting at the

emergency exit row jumped out of her seat and started frantically calling for help. As I approached her she said her husband was having problems breathing. I immediately suspected he was having a heart attack and moved the oth-er passengers out of the row and administered oxygen. The Captain was notified that we had a medical emergency and we prepared to return to Tampa. The only problem with this is we now have 2 passengers standing plus the heart attack victim laying across all 3 seats at the emer-gency exit. We proceeded to move the flight attendant to the other seat in the cockpit, a passenger took her jumpseat, the wife of the victim to the aisle seat adjacent to her husband while another passenger held her 10 year old son on her lap. Can you count the number of FAA viola-tions that we encountered? No F/A’s in the cockpit for takeoff and landing, no passengers occupying a F/A jumpseat, no lap children over the age of 2 and only able bodied persons sitting—let alone laying—at the emergency exit. The Captain made a perfect landing in Tampa and par-amedics were on the jetway to remove the gentleman and wife and they sped off to the hospital. To add to all this chaos, we had just made an overweight landing with full fuel tanks and a full passenger load. The aircraft had to be inspected and we were then cleared to leave and head to STL. Upon arrival in STL, my flying partners and I were tidying the aircraft in order to expedite our departure to Kansas City. It was turning into a very long and dramatic day. Betsy Martin and I noticed a young man standing in the aisle. He approached us and he had driven to the air-port from Chesterfield, MO.—about a 40 minute drive—to personally thank us for saving his father’s life. His com-ments to us made the day not so long and tedious after all. This is one flight I will never forget.

Volunteer Profile:

Dean & Carol Conner

Carol says. . .”I don’t remember the exact day I start-ed with TWA but it was in 1967-68 and I worked in the medical department at 10 Richards Road in the exact place the TWA Museum is now. In April 1969 I went to begin my TWA hostess training and received my TWA Hostess Wings on June 11, 1969. Being a TWA Hostess was my dream job. As a young girl I did my “What I want to be when I grow up” paper on this! I flew until December 1969 when I was furloughed.

I went back to work in the medical department until I was furloughed from that job. Dean and I met at 10 Richards Road in 1970 and we have been all about TWA ever since we got together. We met Pam Blaschum and Betsy Martin at an airline expo event we volunteered at and decided when they started work on the TWA Muse-um we would help out with that and have been volunteer-ing here ever since. We love our TWA and have many great memories as well as friends and “family” from TWA.”

Dean started with TWA in January 1965 and retired in December 2004. Dean received his private pilot’s li-cense in 1967. Dean reminisces “In sixth grade from the playground at Franklin Elementary in Argentine I would watch aircraft taking off and landing at MKC.” That early fascination eventually translated in a career with the airlines. Dean was with TWA 37 years and American Airlines 3 years. During his career he was in fleet service: stores, sheet metal, aircraft, hydraulic, and engine mechanic. Dean received his A & P mechanic license in 1981.

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TWA Suite at the 816 May 26th was the grand opening of the 816 Hotel in the West-port area of Kansas City. The 816 has 25 suites that feature Kansas City companies and we were honored to be asked to deco-rate a TWA room. I must say ours was a visitor favorite! Our suite featured 2 coach seats, a huge mural depicting a “Connie” flying in the clouds, vintage TWA route maps atop the desk and coffee table, Founders photos, a TWA first aid kit to hold hotel amenities, a bar cart, and life vest hanging over the toilet (for your flotation device)! Two unique items are the David Klein poster blanket and the shower curtain that has TWA logos. We will soon be offering those two items for sale in our gift shop.

The bar served a TWA specialty drink, Bocci Ball, which I refer to as the Non-Rev Special!

The Clipped Wings ladies were in attendance wearing their own vintage uniforms. They provided a meet and greet in the lobby!

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Meet our newest TWA Museum Volunteer Sheila Thomson! Nancy Sitzmann asked me if I wanted to help out. I said of course! My stepmom worked for TWA for 30 years as a secretary and loved every minute of it . She just received her 50 year pin and was very excited.

Before retiring I taught Kindergarten for 4 years and Special Education for 24 years.

I have my masters in education and studied in England for half a year through William Jewell.

I had my own dance studio for 3 years and have taught dance since 1977.

I currently teach for Studio 320 and Cultural Ballroom dance.

I also stage and deco-rate houses.

I love to work in my huge flower garden and paint fun glasses, and chairs for my friends.

I hope that I will be an asset to the committee.

Clipped Wings International Reunion

The beginning of October 130 plus former TWA flights attendents/hostesses gathered in Kansas City for a grand reunion and tour of our beginnings with TWA. Clipped Wings International held it's 28th Bi-Annual Convention/Bring Your Heart to Kansas City at the Westin Hotel in Crown Center. Young at heart were we as we toured the TWA Museum, the Airline Museum, many of the buildings of our training and TWA former business offices. What a thrill to tour this Memory Lane! We had a wonderful lunch and tour of the Roasterie in mid-tour and even had a for-mer TWA Captain (in uniform) drive one of the two tour buses. So many of the Clipped Wings group were unaware of the diversity and breath of the TWA Museum. They came back surprised and proud of the work Pam Blaschum and her mighty crew have done to make sure our memory never fades. Good weather, good friends and great memories were created. Clipped Wings is a proud supporter of the TWA Museum. Thank you for your gracious hospitality to us.

Dianne Potas Marks---TWA Flight Attendant I was hired by TWA in Minneapolis in May, 1968 at age 19…Had to wait 6 months before I could start train-ing because you had to be 19 ½. My sister-in-law flew for Northwest and I was supposed to interview with them, but TWA hired me first. I flew up there on my first airplane trip from Sioux Falls just for the inter-view on Western Airlines!

Never left Kansas City as my domicile, except for when KC closed and St. Louis became the HUB. I was the only TWA F/A never to have had international training and never qualified myself to fly International.. Af-ter being recalled from the 1986 strike, everyone had to be qualified, and I was 6 months pregnant, so they said they didn’t want me jumping in the water pregnant! So I only flew the little DC-9 trips on Tuesday-Thursday just so I could be gone 48 hours from home.. I had 2 little boys and a husband at home!

I started out flying the 707, the 727’s and little DC9s in KC.. My favorite layovers were New York, San Francisco and Washington, D.C. On my first flight to NY, we were in the taxi to take us to our hotel in Man-hattan, and we were just like giggling little girls in junior high school (me from South Dakota, the other “Hostess” was from Minnesota) The cab driver heard us talking about it being our first time in the Big Ap-ple, so he started driving us everywhere!! He took us to the Statue of Liberty, through Central Park, showed us Greenwich Village (it was 1968, remember), and on the Waterfront, they were filming “Peyton Place”, so he introduced us to the entire cast. He showed us St. Patrick’s, 7th Avenue, everything NY had to offer. We started to get a bit nervous after a while as to why he was doing this (really?, remember, we were only 19 and from the Midwest) We asked him why he was doing this, he said, “Everyone always gets a bad impression of my city the first time they come, and I wanted you to love it and always want to come back”. He took us to our hotel then, and didn’t want a dime for this or anything!! He just wanted us to love New York. That simple and I always did.

Had a near mid-air over Indiana in 1976 with another TWA plane that made the news. We all landed in Pittsburg and went to the hospital with some injuries. First Officer broke his ankle in multiple places. Gave mouth to mouth CPR on the taxiway in STL (before we got the masks) on a passenger having a heart attack until paramedics got there. Some pretty bad turbulence into Omaha causing everything to fly out of everywhere. Other than that and a few hydraulic problems, and some passenger “drug” overdoses in the 60’s on the red eyes to LA and San Francisco, my flights were all pretty routine..

One funny thing happened that I remember well—was working a hot summer flight schlepping meals in the galley. Had taken off my skirt and just had my smock on to beat the heat. At the end of the flight, I was standing in the back galley of the 727 Stretch, proceeded to take off my smock, and low and behold, I was standing there in my panty hose…Those last 6 people in that little lounge got an eyeful! I looked at those men straight in the eye and said…very calmly, ”What’s the matter, haven’t you seen a women in panty hose before?” I went into the bathroom and I never wanted to see those people again in my life.

Decided to take advantage of the TWA flights, and took a trip by myself in 1970, to Lisbon, Madrid, Rome, Athens, Tel Aviv, Zurich, Frankfurt, and London in 2 weeks!!!! I think I brought $200 with me for 2 weeks. I will never forget that when I went to Jerusalem, on a 2 day tour on a bus, it was my 21st birthday, and I spent it riding a camel on the Mount of Olives, and putting a prayer in the Wailing Wall, and going to the Church of the Holy Sepulchre. What a way to spend your 21st birthday. Always told my sons to make that day memorable in a good way!! Thank you TWA!!

I stayed with flying even after our “joining” with American Airlines. Stayed in STL, got laid off for 4½ years after 9/11, recalled to Chicago, laid off again, then commuted to NY, then went to DFW until 2013 when I finally called it quits. Couldn’t do the holidays, week-ends, and reserve anymore in my 60’s. I do not miss it at all. No regrets. I try to imagine myself sitting on a rocking chair in my 80’s looking back on my life, and can truly say, I had a wonderful life flying, have an amazing husband, and 2 sons who are doctors, and am so thankful for it and my career! I feel like we belong to a really unusual sorority of people who have witnessed the pulse of the World every moment we were flying! Sounds dramatic, but if you think about it, we really did know what was going on around the world at all times. (Watching a space launch in Florida that took off at the very same time I did and we lifted off through the clouds at the same moment was spectacular!!!)

I am having so much fun volunteering at the Museum and thank them for letting me be my “flighty” self and getting my creative juices to go crazy!! I love sewing and am a “fabriholic” so making a TWA Art Bra for charity with propellers is one example. We decorated the 816 Hotel in a TWA theme room, my contribution was making a map decoupage on the lampshades and covering the bar cart with TWA images, also made valances and a luggage rack with fabric from First Class for the hotel room. We also had a hugely popular Hangar Dance, and I made some luminary bags out of map paper and a large lighted PVC wall for picture hanging. ..Great FUN!

TWA needs to be recognized as the truly GREAT Airline it was and the TWA Museum has and is proving that, with everything they have to offer us to see, even though we aren’t “up, up, and away” anymore.

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Welcome to our newest TWA Museum Members!

Since January 2014 we have welcomed the fol-lowing new members:

Jim Davidson, Leawood, Ks

Helen McClelland, Prairie Village, Ks

Patricia Yamashita, Blackfoot, ID

Father Steve Giljum, St. Louis, MO

Albert Gigstad, Nortonville, KS

Todd & Barbara Gigstad, Nortonville, KS

JoAnne Gentine, Northport AL

Sam Greenfields, Parkville MO

Terry McFarland, Independence, MO

John Merchant, Kansas City, MO

Tom & Judy Vavrek

Robert & Julie Baker, Overland Park, KS

Carl & Bobi Zeoli, Independent, MO

George Kolias, Leawood, KS

Kenneth Wright, Parkville, MO

Clark & Marlene Billie, Carverville, PA

Carl Hendricks, Mt. Vernon, IL

Nancy Pate

Jane Squires, Jackson, WY

Mac & Jean Knighton, Wichita, KS

Jan Collier, Wantagh, NY

Ellie Lieback, Colorado Springs, CO

Thomas & Kathy Coleman, Kansas City, MO

Vincent & Ruth Murphy, Lea-wood, KS

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1. Which of the three co-founders of TWA worked as a soda jerk and dishwasher before co-founding TWA?

2. TWA was the first Airline to fly a shipment of livestock. What year was that?

3. How much money did the three co-founders, Jack Frye, Paul Richter, and Walter Hamilton contribute combined, to start TWA??

(Answers on p. 8)

Getting to know John Mays! John has been a life-long resident of Kansas, growing up in Lenexa for most of his young life. At the age of 12, his family moved to a farm in Wellsville. In 1983, John was hired as an Animal Control Officer for the Olathe Police Department. He left the depart-ment in 1992 to become the Executive Director of the Southwest Kansas Humane Society in Liberal, Kansas. During the period from 1983 to 1994, John served as Vice President of the Kansas Animal Control Association, President of the Humane Society of Olathe, and as a Board Member/Officer of the National Animal Control Association (NACA). In 1994, John became the Executive Direc-tor of NACA and served in that capacity for 19 years. During his tenure with the association, John became a longtime customer of Trans World Airlines, meeting new friends and developing a pas-sion and an appreciation for the airline and its employees. When the acquisition of TWA was completed in 2001, John was a life-time TWA Platinum Aviators member (FF#125971112) having flown over a million miles and a member of the TWA Ambassa-dors Club. John’s framed col-lage of his last TWA flights are one of his most treasured pos-sessions. He is an avid collector of TWA display model planes and tin planes/toys, as well as books and films. John is cur-rently the co-owner of Animal Control Training Services, a company that offers on-site training and evaluations to ani-mal control agencies and hu-mane societies throughout the world.

Chris Nold-Connie Simulator Creator Christopher Nold is an aviation enthusiast that just earned his private pilot license. He has been an active participant with the museum for the past year. The most notable endeavor he's made for the museum was creating the interactive Super Constellation simulator for patrons.

"I didn't realize how popular the simulator would become for the museum. I remember a day when a grandmother and her three grandchildren came to explore the museum. There was a young boy in the group and you could tell he really liked airplanes. He climbed up to the simulator and flew the Connie for everything it was worth. Afterward, he was awarded a certificate with his name on it and had a set of aviator wings pinned on his chest. With the biggest smile, the brightest twinkle in his eyes, he stuck his chest out with pride. The room filled with the grandmother's delight in seeing that he had such a great and memorable experience. In that moment, I realized the importance of the museum. This place goes beyond history, the TWA heart still beats here. Its love still reaches people." -Chris Nold (Chris is pictured here with Karen Holden Young and Ruth Richter Holden)

TRIVIA ANSWERS. . . .

1. Jack Frye worked as a soda jerk and dishwasher before co-founding TWA, 2. In 1931 TWA was the first Airline to fly a shipment of livestock. 3. Jack Frye, Paul Richter, and Walter Hamilton contributed $5000.00 combined, to start TWA.

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TWA Museum

10 Richards Road

Kansas City, MO 64116