Cleared to Land in the Desert: Commercial Air Travel‟S Role
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CLEARED TO LAND IN THE DESERT: COMMERCIAL AIR TRAVEL‟S ROLE IN THE GROWTH AND DEVELOPMENT OF LAS VEGAS AS A WORLD-CLASS TRAVEL DESTINATION A DISSERTATION IN History And Political Science Presented to the Faculty of the University of Missouri - Kansas City in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY by DANIEL K. BUBB M.A., University of Nevada, Las Vegas, 2001 B.A., California State University Sonoma, 1996 Kansas City, Missouri 2011 ©2011 DANIEL K. BUBB ALL RIGHTS RESERVED ABSTRACT This study provides a history of commercial aviation in Las Vegas, focusing on the powerful influence commercial air travel had with the financial help of the federal government on Las Vegas‟s growth and development as a world-class travel destination. It especially emphasizes how the airline industry was the catalyst for Las Vegas‟s transformation from an isolated desert town into a world-famous tourist city. Such a study is important to show while Las Vegas‟s story is unique it is a microcosm of a broader regional and national story where airlines played an influential role in the economic growth and development of other western and national cities. Through the use of primary and secondary sources, my dissertation proves that in order to properly understand the history of transportation in the American West, commercial aviation must be included in the story. iii APPROVAL PAGE The faculty listed below, appointed by the Dean of the School of Graduate Studies, have examined a dissertation titled “Cleared to Land in the Desert: Commercial Air Travel‟s Role in the Growth and Development of Las Vegas as a World-Class Travel Destination,” presented by Daniel K. Bubb, candidate for the Doctor of Philosophy Degree, and certify that in their opinion it is worthy of acceptance. Supervisory Committee John Herron, Ph.D., Committee Chairperson Department of History Louis Potts, Ph.D. Department of History Max J. Skidmore, Ph.D. Department of Political Science Dennis Merrill, Ph.D. Department of History David Atkinson, Ph.D. Department of Political Science iv CONTENTS ABSTRACT ............................................................................................................... iii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ……………………………………………………………….. vi INTRODUCTION .................................................................................................... viii Chapter 1. THE AIRLINES COME TO LAS VEGAS ............................................................. 1 2. A SYMBIOTIC RELATIONSHIP FORMS ........................................................... 49 3. JETS IN THE CONSUMER AGE ....................................................................... 98 4. AIRLINE DEREGULATION AND THE MEGA-RESORTS ............................... 132 5. STILL GROWING DURING TOUGH TIMES .................................................... 176 CONCLUSION……………………………………………………………………………215 WORKS CITED..................................................................................................... 222 VITA ................................................................................................................... 230 v ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS This dissertation is the culmination of ten years of research and writing about commercial aviation‟s role in the growth and development of Las Vegas, and personal experience as a former airline pilot based in Las Vegas. Any omissions or inaccuracies are no one else‟s fault but my own. There are several people I would like to thank who helped make this dissertation possible, but because they are so many, I will not be able to include everyone, for which I apologize. I am deeply thankful to my dissertation director Dr. John Herron, and Dr. Dennis Merrill, Dr. Louis Potts, Dr. Max Skidmore, and Dr. David Atkinson at the University of Missouri, Kansas City, all of whom were instrumental in helping me shape and constantly improve this study through their meticulous reading and insightful suggestions. I would like to thank Marie Force of Delta Airlines who was very helpful sending me primary source materials on Western Air Express from the Delta Airlines Archival Center. I also would like to thank Clark County Directors of Aviation Randall Walker and Bob Broadbent, and Manager of International Marketing for McCarran Airport John Hanks for their generosity of time and permission to interview them. My sincere thanks goes to TWA Executive Station Manager Duane Busch, Southwest Airlines Marketing Representative Susan Davis, America West Airlines Marketing Manager Jennifer Myers, Beehive Press Executive Richard Taylor (former General Manager of the Hacienda Hotel), former Hacienda Airlines Chief Pilot Boyd Michael, vi and Rio Resort and Casino Director of Hotel Operations Wanda Chan for their time allowing me to interview them. I would like to thank Mr. Michael Maher of the Nevada Historical Society, and Dr. Peter Michele of the University of Nevada, Las Vegas for allowing me access to primary source materials from the Nevada Senators Patrick McCarran, Alan Bible, and Howard Cannon Collections. Special thanks go to my colleagues at Missouri Valley College, William Woods University, and Gonzaga University for their endless encouragement to persevere and complete the degree. I also am deeply indebted to my students from the College of Southern Nevada, William Woods University, Missouri Valley College, and Gonzaga University who taught me much about life and humbleness, and inspired me to continue striving to be the best teacher and mentor I can be. Finally, I would like to thank my parents Ken and Donna, my brother Ken, and my wife Jennifer for their support, love, and patience. Without them, this work would not have been possible. vii INTRODUCTION “The airlines of America are the vital core of the world‟s biggest industry - - travel and tourism.” Thomas Petzinger Jr. Evening rush hour at McCarran International Airport in the heart of Las Vegas, Nevada is an impressive sight. Air traffic control is busy sequencing incoming Delta, Alaska, Southwest, American, Frontier, United, Virgin Atlantic, Northwest and Allegiant airliners for landing on runways twenty-five left and nineteen right. Nearby, more than two dozen passenger jets patiently wait for clearance to take off on runways twenty-five right and nineteen left. Terminals and concourses are teeming with thousands enplaning and deplaning passengers. In the distance, more of the world‟s finest passenger planes slowly approach the nation‟s seventh busiest and sixth largest mega-port. The big birds have landed in the desert bringing travelers from all parts of the globe to a world-class travel destination. Manned flight has intrigued Americans from the day the Wright brothers successfully flew their experimental powered-glider Kitty Hawk in North Carolina on December 17, 1903, right up to the landing of the six-hundred passenger Emirates Airbus A380 jumbo jet at John F. Kennedy Airport on August 1, 2008. Numerous books, articles, and stories have been written about the phenomenon of man leaving the ground to enter a new frontier in the sky through passenger travel. Few of them however, have addressed the history of what happened when the sky frontier met the ground frontier in the American East and rapidly moved to the American West. As the airplane came west to Denver, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Salt Lake City, Phoenix, and Tucson, these growing cities eagerly reached out to this new viii transportation phenomenon by building airports with graded runways, small terminal buildings, and hotels, working diligently to become part of the prestigious, government-funded transcontinental air mail and passenger transportation system. As this system began to grow, smaller connecting towns were needed for fuel stops, one of which was Las Vegas. An interesting and unexamined part of this story is the meeting of the airplane with this small desert frontier town in the 1920s where the two formed a symbiotic relationship that over eight decades, transformed the tiny oasis into a leading global tourist destination by the end of the twentieth century. Why an unexamined story? Commercial air travel often is taken for granted simply as a faster and more convenient form of transportation, and Las Vegas has been dismissed as an aberration, a bastion of vice and gambling. As a new and unseasoned form of transportation and part of the Civil Air Mail Route 4 (CAM-4), commercial air travel came to a sparsely populated Las Vegas in 1926 when the town was little more than a watering hole, an isolated train stop in the desert. During the Great Depression years when only the wealthy could afford to fly, the airlines struggled while Las Vegas, with construction of the Hoover Dam, experienced a tourism boom. During the war years, civilian passenger travel was put on hold so the airlines could provide planes and personnel for the war effort. But the post-war boom and beginning of the consumer age prompted larger and faster planes to bring more tourists to Las Vegas. McCarran Field expanded its runways and terminal, new casino-resorts appeared downtown, and the city grew. During this time, commercial aviation became a more important source of transportation for tourists, business travelers, and conventioneers wanting to come to the Strip‟s most ix recent, luxurious casino-resorts. The coming of jets in the 1960s revolutionized commercial air travel for the next four decades, offering affordability, comfort, and speed to domestic and global travelers. By century‟s end, the airlines delivered more