WELCOME TO PANAM.ORG
Pan Am Historical Foundation - Welcome to panam.orgTHE PAN AM HISTORICAL FOUNDATION
CELEBRATING SIX DECADES OF PAN AMERICAN WORLD AIRWAYS, JUAN TRIPPE, AND HIS COMPANY'S LEGENDARY CONTRIBUTIONS TO COMMERCIAL AVIATION.
CELEBRATING SIX DECADES OF PAN AMERICAN WORLD AIRWAYS, JUAN TRIPPE, AND HIS COMPANY'S LEGENDARY CONTRIBUTIONS TO COMMERCIAL AVIATION.
ADVANCING PAN AM HISTORY
SINCE 1992















CURRENT


Now available online: Spring/Summer 2025 PAHF Members' "Clipper." Join today to receive PAHF's most up-to-date newsletter!


First 747 delivered to Pan Am at JFK International, December 12, 1969 (University of Miami Special Collections).


Explore the archives of Pan Am-related history and museum websites & access community records at the University of Miami Special Collections.


Dec.1935: PAA Flight Engineer Vic Wright's account of the journey to Manila, China Clipper's arrival back in San Francisco, and Philippine Clipper made its way on the same transpacific route to the same destination (Photo: Stan Cohen/PAHF Collection).


JOIN/RENEW - SUPPORT THE PAN AM HISTORICAL FOUNDATION!! Receive our 2026 Wall Calendar featuring iconic Pan Am ads from Duke University's J. Walter Thompson & Wells Rich Greene collections. Cover ad PAA Capt. John Mattis (Norman Rockwell Museum). Buy Extras: Great for holiday gifts!


B-314 MODEL: Installation by the Pan Am Historical Foundation now at the MAT Rotunda.


Take a deep dive into Pan Am history at Clipper Hall Exhibits: https://exhibits.panam.digital/.


March 7, 1963, after many years of design and construction, Pan Am's iconic building in midtown Manhattan opened its doors. (Exhibit at Clipper Hall).










TAKE-OFF
At the height of the "Roaring 20's" aviation ignited the imaginations of people around the world. Pan American Airways was awarded a US Foreign Mail contract. On October 19th 1927, Pan Am flew the mail from Key West to Havana, Cuba and began a storied history.
EXPLORATIONS
Pan Am's first small land planes soon gave way in the early 1930s to newer, faster flying boats. Pan Am conducted exploratory survey flights over the Pacific and the Atlantic, opening commercial air routes where none had been before.
WORLD WAR TWO
As war clouds loomed, Pan Am and the U.S. government worked closely together to build, secure, and maintain vital air routes in a world increasingly fraught with danger. When Americans entered WW2, Pan Am joined the Allied effort, contracting with the US government & contributing to Allied victory.
POST WAR PAN AM
After World War Two, Pan Am's flying boats gave way to a new generation of large, sleek land planes, set to carry thousands to foreign destinations where once only a few could travel. Ever greater numbers of people were ready to go, and Pan Am was ready to take them.
INTO THE JET AGE
1950's piston-powered airliners were close to their limit of technical sophistication, but they still seemed a safe bet — except to Pan Am's Juan Trippe. He convinced US aircraft manufacturing rivals Douglas and Boeing to push the envelope to build jet-powered commercial aircraft, ushering in the Jet Age.
THE WORLD'S AIRLINE
Juan Trippe's life-long belief in the promise of aviation reached its culmination in 1969, lowering the cost of long distance air travel even further with the introduction of Pan Am Boeing 747s. The new "wide-body" aircraft served millions of new customers, ushering in a truly globalized, and more egalitarian epoch of air travel.
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