Jaunted

There's a reason why American's passengers find Flagship Stewardesses particularly pleasant and helpful. American scours the land to choose young women with a genuine desire to help people—from the damp diaper set right up the scale to octogenarians. They must be cool, poised, capable and possessors of that quality we call 'presence.'

Potential Stewardesses spend five weeks at the American Airlines Stewardess College learning how to look after the wants of passengers before qualifying for flight duty. This modern million-dollar Stewardess College—first of its kind in the world—was built in1957 on a 22-acre campus near Fort Worth, Texas.

Here are the qualifications for an American Stewardess: unmarried; age 20-26 years; height 5 feet 3 inches to 5 feet 8 inches; weight 135 pounds maximum; good physical condition; 20/50 vision not requiring glasses. Nurses or college graduates are preferred, but consideration is given to business school and high school graduates who have extensive experience dealing with the public. If you know of a girl whose eyes are on the skies, and who meets AA's requirements, tell her to see us about a Stewardess position.

So what would happen if they had a 5'8" girl that weighed 140 pounds? Would the plane crash? No, although it took them years more to realize that equal opportunity employment was a good thing.

Related Stories:
· New York City in 1953 [Jaunted]
· Retro Travel [Jaunted]

[Images Scanned from a 1959 American Airlines "Welcome Aboard" pamphlet]