---

The first story of a trilogy.

---

From the time he was a boy Vernon Whitney gazed up at the sky in wonder.  His mother thought him to be slow.  But he was as bright as the next boy in his classes at Alamo Elementary, San Jacinto Junior High and Jim Bowie High School, “Home of the Fightin’ Knives.”  He was just preoccupied with that which was above him to the exclusion of the which was around him.

When the boy read Leonardo DaVinci’s quote, “When once you have tasted flight, you will forever walk the earth with your eyes turned skyward, for there you have been, and there you will always long to return,” he understood exactly what the Renaissance artist was saying.  Whitney longed for the skies.

Pan Am would serve as the gateway to his dreams.  The airline in its heyday was looking for young men they could train to be pilots for the airline and, by the early fifties, had exhausted the supply of former military pilots available to hire.  Whitney, seeing an ad in the back of WING AND A PRAYER while at the lunch counter of the Fort Stockton Regional Airport and Feedlot, applied for the training program.

It was a twist of fate that he would be accepted, his application having been blown from the stack of rejected ones over to the much smaller pile of accepted ones on the desk of the secretary in the Personnel Office at company headquarters.  It seems she’d excused herself to go to the ladies toilet when a gust of wind blew through the window, rearranging the contents atop her desk.  It would not be the last time that fate would mold the career of young Whitney.

It was towards the end of Whitney’s flight training that a clerk in the same Personnel Office was going through his file and realized the application paperwork was not complete.  It seems the Form MOE-U02/52, (Mandatory Optical Exam / Updated February, 1952), was nowhere in the file.  While the clerk thought it was just an oversight, it was more than that.  In fact, the Optical Exam had never been completed.

When that information came to the attention of the Manager of Personnel Service & Requirements, an optical examination was quickly scheduled so that the file would be complete before Vernon Whitney progressed on through the system.  And that is where fate would once again step in.  Despite excellent scores in every category, flawless attendance in flight school, and commendations from his instructors, Whitey could not pass the eye exam.  He wasn’t legally blind, but he was closer to that end of the spectrum than he was 20/20 vision, which was a mandatory requirement.

A gathering of the top decision makers was called.  Of course an exception could not be made, even for an employee as gifted as young Whitney was.  There was a strong case to be made for cutting their losses and sending the boy back home to Fort Stockton.  But then someone in the room suggested that they offer him an alternative.  He could become the first male steward for the airline.

“His knowledge of the cockpit would be a plus.  He’s apparently got a love for flying and an attitude that surpasses that of most employees.  We’ve already sunk a fortune into training him,” the Chief of Airline Operations noted.  “Let’s keep him around.”  And so it was decided.

When told of the option of staying with the airline in a newly created position of ‘steward’ and not being able to actually fly, Whitney was devastated.  His dreams were shattered.  But the thought of returning to Fort Stockton and getting a job at the Rusty Hammer Hardware Store or the Piggly Wiggly was crushing.  He agreed to accept the position he’d been offered.

And so it was that Vernon Whitney became the first male steward for Pan American Airlines.

---

---

Over time, Whitney became philosophical about the whole thing.  In-between serving passengers cold roast beef sandwiches and bottles of lukewarm Coca-cola, he’d quote Socrates, who said, “Man must rise above the Earth—to the top of the atmosphere and beyond—for only thus will he fully understand the world in which he lives.”   

But what really kept him going was the fact that his reputation behind the controls made pilots feel at ease having Whitney release them on long flights.  His knowledge of the controls actually surpassed their own most of the time.  They knew the plane was in good hands and the passengers were safe while he was in the cockpit.  It would give the first and second officers a chance to get some shut-eye, grab a meal, or just get a break from the monotony of flying hours on end over water during international flights.  And it gave Vernon Whitney a chance to do that which he loved above all else.  Fly.

Whitney was based in Houston for Pan Am and quickly came to embrace the city.  The poor weather, high crime rate, absence of any professional sports teams, and lack of walkability was offset by the low cost of living.  With his salary and the money first and second officers would slip him on the side to cover for them, Whitney soon made his way to Gulf Coast Kaiser-Packard, hoping to find the new car of his dreams.  Even with his poor eyesight, he could see that Kaiser had nothing to offer.

Packard, on the other hand, had something that checked all the boxes.  Drawn to a 1956 Packard Clipper Custom Constellation, Whitney felt like Packard may have made 1,466 of the model, but this one was made just for him.  The car was finished in two-tone white and red over red and black upholstery, power provided by a 352ci V8 paired with a push-button Ultramatic automatic transmission. Equipment included a Torsion-Level Ride suspension system, power-assisted drum brakes, power steering, a power antenna, fender skirts, and a push-button radio.

The Tangier Reds and Dover White colors not only set off the lines of the long coupe, but the were also some of the exotic locations he flew for Pan Am,  Equipment included hooded headlamps, a retractable antenna, tinted windows, fender skirts, reverse lights, and dual exhausts that exit through the rear bumper.

With the new Packard Clipper Constellation coupe tucked into his parking space at the Benjamin Apartments on Webster Street, Whitney made his way up to the second floor studio.  He grabbed a cold Pearl from the Frigidaire, stripped down to his boxer shorts, and laid down on his bed in front of the window.  The air was still and pungent, the humidity hung in the room like a damp blanket, slowing down even the mosquitos buzzing in his ear.

Despite the fact that he wasn’t able to “officially” be the one behind the controls on the flights he was on, Vernon Whitney thought life was good.

---

---