The Newsletter of the Pan Am Historical Foundation
Following is the letter sent out by PAHF President C.W. Runnette to all members of the Foundation as part of the Annual Meeting packet. It brings members and friends up to date on the current activities of PAHF.
February 2006
To All Pan Am Historical Foundation Members:
As the Foundation begins its 15th year, our finances are strong and our membership is showing encouraging upward momentum.
Our 14th year, 2005, was particularly eventful. The annual meeting of the membership was held in April in Washington, D.C. in conjunction with a highly successful 30th Anniversary Reunion of the last Pan Am flight out of Saigon. A similarly popular 70th Anniversary Celebration of the launch of the China Clipper was sold out in November at the San Francisco International Airport Museum. The enthusiastic participation of the membership in these and other local events worldwide was a positive indication of the health and vitality of the Foundation, and of our shared commitment to preserving the legacy of the airline.
Among those we lost last year, I would like to recognize, in particular, the contributions of Dave Abrams and Gene Banning to the formation and growth of the Foundation. Dave took a very active role in the Foundation from the beginning. He dealt successfully with the University of Miami and the Historical Association of Southern Florida when we had to move quickly to find a home for our archives and memorabilia after we received them from the Bankruptcy Court. He remained a leader of the Pan Am community in Miami, and active in the search for a Museum, the renovation of Dinner Key, and the success of Mary Goshgarian’s Pan Am AWARE store. Dave was Chief Pilot of the Latin American Division for many years.
Gene Banning was one of the longest serving pilots in LAD – from his start in the flying boats to the 747. He was also a guiding member of the Foundation from its inception, and his book, “Airlines of Pan Am Since 1927”, has been referred to by our resident historian, Kathleen Clair, as a “treasure.”
As I said last year, in our effort to enhance the appeal of the Foundation to a new, younger membership and to potential donors to help us pursue such basic objectives as completing the sorting and organization of our archives at the Richter Library, making a representative documentary, and finding that elusive museum, we’ve modified our mission to look forward as well as back. As a first step, we presented the first “Clipper Heritage Award” at the concluding dinner of the Vietnam Reunion following last year’s annual meeting in Washington, to Robert and Leila Macauley and their greatly admired and successful disaster relief organization, AmeriCares.
To remind you, the Clipper Heritage Award recognizes, as in the case of the Macauleys and AmeriCares, a significant contribution to humanity involving aviation or technological pioneering which exemplifies the vision, innovation and adventure that was Pan American World Airways. The Board and I invite your suggestions for future nominees.
Some of last year’s highlights and accomplishments-
• We were a proud participant and sponsor of the extraordinary Vietnam Reunion in Washington, D.C. which drew more than 300 Pan Amers from around the world. It was ably conceived and organized by Al Topping, and featured the first Clipper Heritage Award by the Foundation as referred to above. We also recognized crew members and others involved in Pan Am’s last flight out of Saigon with special certificates of appreciation.
• The Foundation again participated in the World Wings International Charity Drawing at their annual meeting in Paris, netting six, repeat, six winners, and $5,098 toward the continuing organization and cataloguing of the Pan Am archives at the Richter Library at the University of Miami.
• We took advantage of a remarkable effort by John Luetich, son of Mary Luetich (with more than 50 years of PA service between them) to collect on one CD more than 1,000 pictures of Pan Am airplanes and people, including more than 700 plus of our aircraft – every type we flew. The CD is entitled “Pan Am 1927-1991 The Story in Pictures”, and is being offered for sale (see enclosure) to the membership to benefit the Foundation.
• Our Miami Museum Committee has continued to meet with the Historical Association of Southern Florida (which holds significant Pan Am memorabilia), together with the Eastern Air Lines Historical Foundation, regarding potential sites. The focus is again on Watson Island.
• Both NOVA, the PBS documentary series with a slant toward science and technology, and American Experience, its sister documentary series broadly focused on history, after expressing serious interest, declined to offer initial funding. Consequently, we’re redirecting our efforts. We have received encouragement from the National Endowment for the Arts to apply for an initial so-called “scripting” grant. This, we understand would, if approved, give our project a critical level of credibility and significantly improve our chances to obtain the nearly one million dollars of funding we will ultimately need – even for one quality documentary hour. The focus of the proposed documentary remains on the China Clipper (and the birth of radio air navigation as developed by PAA).
• We were a sponsoring partner of the China Clipper Celebration in November at the Airport Museum in San Francisco, organized and led in outstanding fashion by the Museum’s Aviation Curator, John Hill. Among the principal viewing attractions were the John McCoy watercolors of Pan Am first flights, donated by the Foundation. Excellent speakers covered most of the elements critical to the success of the China Clipper, culminating with wonderful reminiscences of his father by Charlie Trippe. One particularly memorable outgrowth of the Celebration is this year’s Foundation calendar – Flying Boats of the Pacific.
• On the West Coast, we videotaped interviews with Bob Blake, Don Bond, Bob Valentine and Bert Torrance to add to our store of reminiscences of Pan Am that we believe have historical or documentary value.
• We were approached by Captain Don Cooper from the Pan Am family in the Northwest to assist in their effort to convince Boeing’s Museum of Flight (MoF) to paint the Museum’s newly acquired DC-2 (originally a Pan Am aircraft) in Pan Am’s colors. The MoF is looking for $50,000 to seal the deal, but there does not appear to be any competition, so any reasonable amount would seem likely to result in a choice for Pan Am. The Foundation agreed to add an amount to be determined, based in part on what the Pan Am Northwest effort may produce, and with the understanding donations via the Foundation could be retrieved if our combined final offer to the MoF is insufficient. So far, there’s less than $2,000 in our kitty, so if you would like to support the effort, send your donation to us, identified accordingly, and if the final amount doesn’t persuade the MoF, you may have it back.
• 2005 also marked the necessary transfer of editorial direction of the Clipper with the loss of Stan Gewirtz, Editor Extraordinaire and chronicler of the many Washington trials of Pan Am’s later years. It was and is our very good fortune to have attracted an ardent loyalist as well as a true pro – a former editor of the real Clipper, Mort Young.
Our priorities in 2006 will remain the documentary, a museum, and our future, in addition to completing the processing and cataloguing of our archives – and stimulating their use by scholars, researchers, etc. At the same time, our focus will shift to Miami and Latin America, first with our upcoming annual meeting in Dinner Key, and then with our 2007 calendar. It will feature our Latin American roots, marking the airline’s 80th anniversary – for which we need to plan a 2007 party. Key West has been suggested, and your ideas will be welcome.
Pull out the Strategy paper I sent you last year, and send along one thought on how to improve this operation. I can’t promise to make it happen, but the Board will have to listen to it.
We are all grateful for your continuing commitment to the Foundation and to the preservation of the great name and memory of Pan American World Airways.
C.W. Runnette
President