Veterans Spread Their Wings

During the dull, dragging, off-duty hours in the South Pacific, pilots in the Marine "Red Devil" squadron killed time with long bull sessions. When they talked of postwar plans, Captain Kendall Everson always had the" same answer: "I'm going to start an airline." His tent mate, Captain Gerard Ray, liked the idea, often argued its merits with Captain John Daugherty, who thought it overambitious.

In Cleveland last week, 24-year-old Ken Everson had his airline, Executive Airline Service, and one plane. Partner Gerry Ray was in Washington trying to buy more. The third partner: Scoffer Daugherty. They hoped to serve companies large enough to use air charter service often, but too small to maintain their own planes.

The Boom Is On. Similar foxhole dreams were hatching into fledgling airlines all over the nation. Many of the 350,000 pilots trained during the war wanted to stay in aviation. But most need additional training to step into commercial flying jobs, even if there were any open. (U.S. airlines now have only 5,000 pilot jobs.) Nor did they like what was left--$30-a-week jobs at airline ticket counters.

So why not start an airline? Many of them have already found that this calls for more than a pilot's license, a surplus plane and free-enterprising spirit. Most decided to fly cargo. It looked easier than flying passengers. But plans to fly cargo were one thing. Getting contracts was another. Some were lucky.

In Texas, ex-Army Pilots William V. Wood and Bill Dobbins pooled their $16,000 savings to buy two surplus planes. Last week their Fleetwood Airways started flying the San Antonio Evening News to subscribers in the Rio Grande Valley, 230 miles away. But that brought in only $40 a day, hardly enough to cover expenses. Others were not even that lucky.

Frank Joseph Habig easily got 27 fellow marines at Cherry Point, N.C. to chip in $40,000 to back his plan to fly fresh seafood from seaport towns to the Midwest. Last November his Airborne Seafoods, Inc. bought a DC-3. Last week, Airborne was still looking for its first pay load.

Nor was there any money to be made on hand-to-mouth freight flying, without ample capital and nationwide offices to line up business. Saunie Gravely, a 22-year-old ex-gunnery instructor, had found that out. He and 40 other veterans in Newark had raised $40,000, formed Veterans' Air Express Co., Inc. After two months of flying everything they could lay their hands on, lobsters, penicillin, flowers, turkey, etc., they decided to try flying passengers.

Trouble, Trouble, Trouble. Those who were lucky enough to bag contracts had other troubles: maintenance costs were high, the best surplus planes were snapped up by the big companies; attempts to borrow money under the G.I. bill of rights were turned down because the Reconstruction Finance Corp. did not consider such airlines a good risk.

Many a freight and charter line hoped to grow into a full-fledged, regularly scheduled feeder line. But to get permission to fly a new route, airlines must prove to the Civil Aeronautics Board that the service is economically necessary, the company financially able to supply it. The process of proving it is long (a year or two) and expensive. Said one pilot: "I figure it will cost me $75,000."

Nor does CAB favor applications from untried companies. Since its creation in 1938, CAB has granted only one short feeder route to a new line.

Actually the swarm of new airlines has dimmed the future of all unscheduled carriers. They can now fly without CAB permission. But so many have started up that CAB will probably bring them under strict regulation to prevent cutthroat competition and keep flying as safe as it is. If that happens, many a vet line will have to fold its wings.

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