Sunday, May 21, 2017

imagine what an incredible thrill it must have been to get a ride in a clipper

11 comments:

  1. In particular one of the versions from 2001:

    http://2.bp.blogspot.com/--XjMuo2RATg/TzaVTeNY7qI/AAAAAAAAAlM/a3QLvmDsZe8/s1600/2001%2Borion%2B1.jpg

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    Replies
    1. yes, a ride into orbital space would be incredible, but not affordable to 99% of the people on Earth. The old clipper was affordable to about 60% I think

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    2. Imperial Airways could be compared to Pan Am, so the ticket prices might well have been in the same ballpark: "The longest flights could span over 12,000 miles and cost as much as $20,000 when adjusted for inflation."

      Today a lot of Westerners would be able to scrape together $20K for an airplane ticket, but in 1939 not many - and certainly not 60% of the population - had that much extra disposable income.

      When writing about vintage motorcycles and cars, I often have to research how much a skilled worker earned in a given year and a given country, when trying to figure out how affordable (or not) the vehicle in question was. One of my older friends here in Denmark, which always was a wealthy country, told of parking his Nimbus motorcycle outside a cinema. That was right after WW2. When he got out, there'd always be a crowd waiting for it to be started up, af most everybody could only afford a bicycle.

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    3. hang on now... the clipper was more affordable is what I said, and I don't doubt it. Lets see what the price was for a clipper flight before we start throwing around the sum of 20 thousand dollars, which seems ridiculously high

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    4. This aircraft in the photo is a 1935 or older, as the photo was taken in 1935. This means it's not a 314 model, San Fran to Honolulu model for $675, 1939 to 1946 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boeing_314_Clipper

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    5. more likely this photo was of the Atlantic island hopper type, as Pan Am started with South American routes and 28 Clippers between 1931 and 1946. During this time, Pan Am operated Clipper services to Latin America from the International Pan American Airport at Dinner Key in Miami, Florida. This plane looks a lot more like the S42 used from San Fran to China. The fare from San Francisco to Manila or Hong Kong in 1937 was $950 one way (about $15830 in 2016) and $1,710 round trip. But since that was 2 years after this photo... it's most likely that this photo and the year 1935 was primarily on the Miami - Rio de Janeiro route. I can't find the price of the tickets to the South American route though, I've spent 30 minutes looking

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    6. In 1939, a one-way ticket from San Francisco to Honolulu cost $278 according to http://www.pacificaviationmuseum.org/pearl-harbor-blog/pan-ams-pacific-clippers/

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    7. In 2010 dollars, that is $4,317

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    8. Also, you're entire premise is the price of the longest trip, for about 20 thousand dollars. I believe you might agree with me that a lot more people took shorter flights than longer flights, therefore - more people paid far less than 20 thou for a ticket.

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    9. And if they paid more than 300 a ride, then they were paying as much as a cheap car, and anyone making 5 dollars a day could afford a model T in the 1915-1925 era... so, anyone making 5 a day could afford a cheap plane ticket for a nearby glamour vacation in the carribean - is my premise for saying that 60% of people could afford that plane ticket. I'll stand by that, as we know a hell of a lot of people owned a car and drove it in 1935.

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  2. I stand corrected (damn!...)

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