Inland Air Lines

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Inland Air Lines
Founded1930;94 years ago (1930)
as Wyoming Air Service
Ceased operationsApril 9, 1952;
72 years ago (1952-04-09)
merged into Western Air Lines
Parent company Western Air Lines (1944–1952)
Headquarters Casper, Wyoming [1] until 1944
Los Angeles from 1944
Key peopleRichard Leferink

Inland Air Lines was a small trunk carrier, a scheduled United States airline which started as Wyoming Air Service (WAS), founded by Richard Leferink in May 1930, initially as a flying school. [2] [3] In the mid-1930s WAS won airmail contracts for routes in Wyoming, Nebraska, South Dakota and Montana. WAS changed its name to Inland Air Lines on 1 July 1938. [4] [5]

Pursuant to the Civil Aeronautics Act of 1938, the Civil Aeronautics Authority (CAA) of the United States certificated Inland as a United States scheduled airline on March 28, 1939. [6] Thereafter, the Civil Aeronautics Board (CAB), which succeeded the CAA in 1940, regulated Inland as a trunk carrier.

In 1944, the CAB approved the purchase of Inland by Western Air Lines. [7] However, although Western controlled the overwhelming majority of Inland’s stock, as a Wyoming corporation, Inland could not be merged into Western without the unanimous consent of its shareholders, and a few shareholders continued to hold out. Therefore, Inland continued to exist as a separate subsidiary of Western until 1952, when Wyoming law changed, the CAB gave final approval and Western was finally able to merge Inland into itself. [4] [8]

Inland styled itself as "The Wings Over The West." [9] In 1948, Inland accounted for less than a half percent of total trunk airline Revenue-Passenger Miles, the smallest trunk airline by that measure. [10] And as of December 1949, it operated only a single DC-3. [11]

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References

  1. ↑ Inland Air Lines timetable image, accessed May 4, 2024
  2. ↑ Casper - Wyoming Air Service, Inc., capitalized at $50,000, filed articles of incorporation., Jackson's Hole (WY) Courier, 29 May 1930
  3. ↑ Flying School Increases Fast, Casper (WY) Star-Tribune, 15 June 1930
  4. 1 2 Serling, Robert J. "Chapter Ten". The Only Way to Fly: the Story of Western Airlines, America’s Senior Air Carrier. Garden City, NY: Doubleday. ISBN   0385013426.
  5. ↑ Air Schedules To Be Changer July 1, Rapid City Journal, 28 June 1938
  6. ↑ "Inland Air Lines, Inc.—Certificate of Public Convenience and Necessity". Civil Aeronautics Authority Reports. 1: 34–38. February 1939 – July 1940. hdl:2027/uc1.b2938502.
  7. ↑ "Western Air Lines, Inc., acquisition of Inland Air Lines, Inc". Civil Aeronautics Board Reports. 4: 654–669. December 1942 – June 1944. hdl:2027/osu.32435022360648.
  8. ↑ Announces Completion of Air Lines Merger, Billings Gazette, 10 April 1952
  9. ↑ "Inland Air Lines". AirTimes: Collector's Guide To Airline Timetables. AirTimes. Retrieved May 4, 2024.
  10. ↑ "Scheduled Air Carrier Operations". Civil Aeronautics Journal. 10 (3). Civil Aeronautics Administration: 32. March 15, 1949. hdl:2027/osu.32437011223969.
  11. ↑ "U.S. Scheduled Air Transport Industry". Aviation Week. 52 (9): 121. February 27, 1950. ISSN   0005-2175.{{cite journal}}: CS1 maint: date and year (link)
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