The Glamorous and Groundbreaking World of Early Flight Attendants

Glamour Girls of the Sky

The new show Pan Am, debuting later this month, focuses on the lives of flight attendants in the 1960s. Becoming one of these “glamor girls of the air,” as this 1958 Life cover story calls them, was a difficult process. Only three to five out of every 100 girls who applied was accepted. “The job they want does not pay extraordinarily well, only $255 to $355 a month ... But the chance to fly, to see the world and meet all sorts of interesting people—mostly the kind of men who can afford to travel by plane—gives the job real glamo[u]r,” the article went on to explain. Take a look back through other photos of early flight attendants from Life.com.

Photograph by Peter Stackpole/Time & Life Pictures.
The First Stewardess

Ellen Church (left) became the world's first stewardess on May 15, 1930, working a flight from Oakland to Chicago for Boeing Air Transport (which later became United Air Lines). A registered nurse and aspiring pilot, she approached BAT for a job flying. After being rejected, she suggested staffing flights with nurses to assuage passengers' fear of flying. BAT agreed to a three-month trial, putting Church in charge of hiring eight nurses to work as stewardesses for $125 per month. Here, Church poses with Virginia Schroeder on May 14, 1940, celebrating the tenth anniversary of the founding of their profession.
United Air Lines/AP via LIFE.com.
WA Stewardess, Clipboard in Hand, 1937

In the ensuing years, nearly all airlines hired staffs full of women but adhered to a stringent set of rules: a stewardess had to be a single woman, and under 5 feet 4 inches and 115 pounds. Early flight attendants tended to passengers but were also responsible for mechanical odds and ends, even fueling planes.

Time Life Pictures/Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images.
Cocktails in the Cockpit, 1936

Air hostess Daphne Kearley prepares a drink on a flight to Paris. Originally, men worked as cabin crew or "stewards." In the '30s, as women took over the skies, they were known as "stewardesses."
Ward/Getty Images via LIFE.com.
A Course in Charm, 1946

As the allure of the profession grew, women worldwide attempted to land a spot in the sky. The Trans World Airline (TWA) headquarters in Kansas City, Mo., offered grooming, charm, poise, reading, language, and entertainment courses for aspiring stewardesses, such as those pictured.
Bert Garai/Getty Images via LIFE.com.
Dealing with Drunks

Students at the McConnell Air Hostess School learn how to deal with inebriated passengers on Jan. 1, 1947.
Photograph by Wallace Kirkland/Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images.
Perfect Posture, McConnell Air Hostess School, 1947

Women did not often last long in the sky according to a 1958 article on the alluring career of air hostess. The reporter suggested, “The girls do not quit because the jobs pull on them, but because being so attractive, they soon get proposals of marriage.”

Wallace Kirkland/Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images.
Training Tricks

One McConnell student chews gum in hopes of reducing her double chin. By 1958, U.S. airlines employed 8,200 stewardesses, according to Life. Among other qualifications, "a girl should be between 21 and 26 years old, unmarried, reasonably pretty and slender, especially around the hips, which will be at eye level for the passengers,” the same article explained.
Wallace Kirkland/Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images.
Clean Nails, Please!

Prospective stewardesses study grooming at TWA school in 1961.
Michael Rougier./Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images
Training, 1966

Aspiring United Airlines flight attendants practice evacuating.
Yale Joel/Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images.
White-Glove Service, 1968

Two Pan Am flight attendants embrace before their first transatlantic flight from New York to Moscow.

Photograph by Arthur Schatz/Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images.
Hot on the Job, 1972

Uniforms got smaller over the years. On Southwest Airlines (pictured), the motto was "sex sells seats."

Related: See more images of early flight attendants on Life.com, including celebrity flight attendant Ellen Forseth, who dated the shah of Iran and the early Air India uniform. There, you can also see photo of the early days of flying, when it was a lot more fun.

Photoshot/Getty Images