I was always a child of the railroads, so Union Station held much more magnetism for me than the airport. Still, in the 1960s, Sky Harbor was a sweet little airport. It had a romantic name. The old blond-brick West Terminal and tiny control tower hearkened back to aviation's infancy — it had only been six decades since the Wright Brothers' first powered flight.
You boarded by stairs — jetways were several years off. The new East Terminal was graced by a dramatic mural of Phoenix's founding myth and flight science above the airy modern waiting room. It also had a second-story observation deck, where one could watch the airplanes, complete with telescopes. Our Cub Scout den was given a tour of the control tower. All this was before hijackings and the rise of the present Security State.
It was a beautiful airport with a certain '50s charm. One reached it from 24th Street along grassy parkways with trees. And back then, the route into downtown was still lined with pleasant motels and "auto courts," all human scale.
Sky Harbor had two runways, which were plenty back then. On the south edge was the Air National Guard midair refueling tanker wing (Richard Nixon gave a campaign speech in the big hangar during the 1972 campaign).
On the north side, beyond the general aviation hangars, were the Southern Pacific tracks, which carried three passenger trains a day in each direction. The best airplane watching was on 40th Street, which was a two-lane affair that dipped into the riverbed and marked the east boundary of the airport. The 727s and 707s came in right overhead.
Airlines were highly regulated. Hubs were far in the future. So regional players such as Bonanza, Hughes AirWest and Western were as important as United, American and Continental. I made my first airplane flight from LA to Phoenix when I was ten (we had gone there on the Sunset Limited, by far the more enchanting journey for me). Flying was special then. People dressed up. Airlines treated you very well. There were no cattle calls or lines from LockUp.
Sky Harbor was an accidental airport. Before the Depression, a number of landing strips were sited around Phoenix. This one, built in 1928 by Scenic Airways, was purchased by the city in 1935 and improved thanks to New Deal money, manpower, and materials. TWA began regular service three years later and for decades was a dominant carrier. For several years in the 1970s, TWA ran 747 service between Phoenix and Chicago. The north side of the airport handled general aviation until the 1990s, when it was shifted to Deer Valley and Goodyear airports to make more space for airlines.
The spectacular Paul Coze three-panel mural, "The Phoenix," in the East Terminal, which opened in 1962. Notice people dressed up to fly. When the terminal was demolished, the mural was moved to the rental-car facility in 2021.
Today, of course, Sky Harbor is a behemoth. On the outside, it's ugly, adds hugely to the heat island and air pollution, is a monster to navigate, and has lost all its former grace. This is hardly a peculiarity to Phoenix — American airports are generally unattractive, as if warning you architecturally of the travel ordeal ahead.
The heat island issues are more pressing for Phoenix, with longer and hotter summers, and when the monsoon storms collide with all that heat being released by this vast concrete monster.
Still, Phoenix goes out of its way to be homely: The Goldwater Terminal (Terminal Four) looks like a massive jail. The old West Terminal was demolished for — what else? — a surface parking lot. Driving on I-10 south of the Salt, you can still see the old control tower. The mural in aging Terminal 2 (the old East Terminal) was profaned in the 1980s by the sign of a restaurant.
On the other hand, Sky Harbor is the friendliest airport I've ever encountered. The inside of Terminal Four, especially, resembles a very nice shopping mall, which is as good as it gets for most Americans. The Sky Train makes it easy to get from light rail (WBIYB) or the east economy garage to the terminals.
Sky Harbor is also Phoenix's last unassailable economic asset that hasn't been poached by the suburbs. For now it remains a hub for American Airlines after the merger with US Airways; that status can't be taken for granted.
It is also Southwest's busiest "station" (the company doesn't like the word hub). On top of that, Alaska and United are major players. I can't think of another major airport with more choices. A "fortress hub" Sky Harbor is not. As of 2016, 1,200 aircraft and 120,000 passengers arrived and departed daily.
All the Williams-Gateway ("Phoenix-Mesa Gateway Airport") hype is a pipe dream. Airlines serve Sky Harbor because it's relatively inexpensive. This is different from, say, LAX, whose costs gave rise to competition. The old idea of an Eloy mega-jetport is dead. In both cases, the costs and trouble of starting up major service would be prohibitive (see Denver International Airport), and both are far from population centers. It certainly won't happen given today's fiscal and economic climate. The major airlines don't want Gateway, as long as the Phoenix keeps costs in line. And the developers helpfully continue to encroach on Gateway and Eloy.
This has come at a cost. Some of the city's most historic barrios were bulldozed to — well, I'm not sure what. The land is now office "parks" or empty. Among the excuses given were safety and noise abatement, but if you've ever flown into LAX, San Diego, Boston or many other airports with runways adjacent to neighborhoods, this smells.
The barrios simply lacked the political power to push back. The cultural and historic loss was immense. Their demise, in turn, destabilized Maryvale. I'd love to know who got rich off this con.
In addition, Sky Harbor has its own revenue stream, benefits from the hidden federal subsidies for air travel and operates largely disconnected from city government. It deserves its own experienced beat reporter, not just covering airlines but the airport's inner workings, conflicts of interest, environmental issues, etc.
Harry Mitchell, as Tempe mayor and Sky Harbor nemesis, used to warn that the airport coveted everything north to McDowell and east to Seventh Street.
Meanwhile the city aviation department also operates the Deer Valley and Goodyear airports, the former a large general aviation site, and the latter, where the old Naval Air Station once stood, would make a great logistics center.
The gigantic offsite rental car building is another curiosity — another reason the airport needs more scrutiny. The rental hub is bigger than many airport terminals in medium-sized cities. I guess the bigs at City Hall were trying to get ahead of "growth" — both the old East Terminal and Terminal Three were overwhelmed years before their projected capacity.
Such thinking now fails to account for the discontinuity that is already upon us with Arizona's ongoing Depression. I suppose if things don't work out, an apron can be extended to the rental-car building, repurposed as the only terminal.
At least a proposal to take away the distinct name in favor of "Phoenix International Airport" was turned back years ago, and most people still call it by its historic title.
Sky Harbor gallery (click for a larger image):
Amelia Earhart visits Phoenix in 1931, but at the old South Central airstrip instead of Sky Harbor. (USC Libraries)
Ruth Reinhold, Arizona's most famous aviatrix, in 1933. She was Barry Goldwater's personal pilot for 20 years. The 1920s and '30s were high times for women pilots. In addition to Earhart and Reinhold, Britain had Amy Johnson. She was the first female pilot to fly from London to Australia. Jean Batten of New Zealand, Nancy Bird-Walton of Australia, and Britain's Beryl Markham were among the other pioneers.
An overhead view of the airport in 1935.
The airport was tiny in the 1930s, but it featured a wedding chapel.
Taking off toward the west in the 1930s, there's plenty of space between the airport and the city. On the right is the Southern Pacific main line, lined by shade trees, and the SP yard at 16th. Street.
An American Airlines pilot outside the Sky Club in the 1940s (McCulloch Bros./ASU Archives).
The terminal in 1952. It eventually became known as the West Terminal or today's missing Terminal 1.
This map shows the airport layout in 1958.
Here's a view from the 1960s, with the West Terminal in the foreground and the new East Terminal (Terminal 2 before its 2020 demolition) in the upper left. On the center-right is the Arizona Air National Guard base, which remains and operates tanker planes.
Another view of the West Terminal with all-propeller airliners.
The landscaped inviting entrance to the West Terminal in the 1950s. Like many Phoenix landmarks, it was designed by Lescher & Mahoney architects.
The distinctive lines of a Lockheed Constellation airliner. Until the 1970s, passengers deplaned via roll-up stairs and walked through the gate.
Passengers board airplanes outside the West Terminal in the 1950s. Sky Harbor didn't get its first jetways until the early 1970s, on some gates in the East Terminal (Terminal 2).
The East Terminal soon after it opened in 1962. Bonanza Air Lines operated in the West from 1945 to 1968, eventually headquartered in Phoenix (Phoenix Airport Museum).
A 1960s postcard shows the new East Terminal in the foreground and the older West Terminal to the right.
The East Terminal in the 1970s with grass and trees on the parkway from 24th Street (Brad Hall collection).
East Terminal main waiting room in this pre-security-checkpoint era. The Paul Coze mural, "The Phoenix," graces the far wall (Brad Hall collection).
Coze working on a panel for his mural, 1962 (Brad Hall collection).
Details of the Paul Coze mural, originally in the East Terminal, now in the Rental Car Facility (Phoenix Airport Museum).
President John F. Kennedy is greeted by Sen. Carl Hayden in 1961. The president was in Phoenix for Carl Hayden Day, part of a reelection strategy engineered by Hayden aide Roy Elson to introduce the long-serving Senator to thousands who had moved to Arizona since Hayden's 1956 victory.
With a smog-free 1960s day, here's the Sheraton Skyrider's Hotel, which was on the parkway to the west of the West Terminal.
An aerial shot of the airport in the 1970s. The landscaped parkway entered from 24th Street.
An overhead view of the two existing terminals in 1978. To the right, construction is under way on Terminal 3 and a new (now gone) tower. Sky Harbor had only two runways. By the 2000s, when the third runway opened, it was the largest airport in America with only two (San Diego's Lindbergh Field still has only one).
The supersonic Concorde visits Phoenix in 1986.
The Concorde takes off from its Sky Harbor visit (Brad Hall collection).
Hometown America West Airlines, which merged with USAirways and eventually American.
One of America West's few 747s.
It looks like an airplane landing on a seaside airport. But with Camelback in the distance, this plane is landing at Sky Harbor while the Salt River floods.
In 1990, Terminal 4, to be named for Barry Goldwater, is under construction.
An artist's rendering of the facelift and expansion being given to Terminal 3. Note the Sky Train in the background. The lush, inviting exterior of the old airport is long gone.
The Sky Train now connects the terminals with the east parking garage and the 44th Street light-rail station.
RELATED: Aviation in old Phoenix.
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My book, A Brief History of Phoenix, is available to buy or order at your local independent bookstore, or from Amazon.
Read more Phoenix history in Rogue's Phoenix 101 archive.
When I worked as a video writer/producer for SRP I produced a slide show (before video projection) for the 50th anniversary of Sky Harbor. The fun part was finding and discovering photos and memorablia that represented the 50 years. In those days our "history" was not particularly appreciated - so few people had saved or collected all this stuff. It was a wonderful experience. Lots
of digging around, such as interviewing the woman who taught Barry Goldwater how to fly, plus lots of photos that had never been officially collected until then. The 50th event was held in what was then Charlie Keating's hangar. But that's another story.
Posted by: DavidS | September 06, 2011 at 11:54 AM
BTW, Cal is back, with a priceless Jeremiad on the elections open thread post...
Posted by: Rogue Columnist | September 06, 2011 at 12:24 PM
PS, Phoenix without Sky harbor would be like Mexico without the illegal drug trade.
NO MAS
As the arch enemy of the Thunder bolt kid I deliver this message. Bill Bryson was and is a boring dude. If Iowa was such a great place for the Thunderbolt Kid why did he move to the dankness of England? Maybe to escape from the religious whackos? I may have been born upon the dark soil of a Iowa river bank but life was never like the Thunderbolt kids tale of happy bland mediocrity. For me it was cold, hungry and deadly until I landed in the great Sonoran desert of Sunnyslope. Home of horned toads and recovering tubercular’s. A place where the only green things were Mexican spotted lizards and Saguaros. The water quit north of the Arizona Canal.
The valley of the Sun was a great little spread out berg of less than 200,000 folks and if you fired your rifle no one noticed. The Slope still had mountain lions and deer, plenty of Jack rabbits and a ton of Chuckwallas. Selling tortoises, lizards, scorpions to locals and dough nut holes at the Walbash trailer court along with a paper route brought in more money than my dad was making working at a small grocery store.
Summer brought the lettuce fields, grapes and then the sweet potato sheds in the winter. If you were not sixteen you could not get a social security number but you could be 10 and work for cash. Puberty at twelve brought to ones attention the chicitas tan lindas swabbed in long colorful clothing under the grape vines and bent over in the lettuce fields. And at the end of the day we would jump fully clothed into the canal to cool off and make wet love. (Only pendejuo gringos didn’t cover their skin (500 skin cancers and counting at 71). Hitchhiking to Central and Jefferson or riding a bicycle got you to downtown Phoenix for the movies or to hang around the duce and watch a fight or two. Phoenix was a nice town in the 50’s. NO MAS.
Which brings me to today, the age of Urbanization, where to qualify as a real city the population must exceed 10 million? I will pass on being a slum dog millionaire living in a dung heap of bodies piled on top of each other 20 or more dizzy stories high. I would rather survive on the edge of the Mohave Desert as a hermit than congregate with the arm pit sweaty bodies that inhabit the downtown art walk. I have seen more outstanding “eye candy” in a lettuce field on a hot summer day than I have ever seen in downtown Phoenix art scene. Male field workers had great bodies before firemen existed. But if you are into pimpled up, tattooed under the influence weirdo’s the Roosevelt sidewalks is a go.
Consequently I have decided to pass on the “Urbanization” dialogue and spend my time reading (like a real man. Whatever that might be?) the diatribes of folks like Ed Abbey and Chuck Bowden. And when available toss in a Talton publication. (I also recommend eearth)
Mas Tarde, The Horned toad kid from a small hole in a large Sahuaro.
Posted by: cal Lash | September 06, 2011 at 01:00 PM
Jon-Jeremaid? U have me confused with Soleri? A jeremiad is a long literary work, usually in prose, but sometimes in poetry, in which the author bitterly laments the state of society and its morals in a serious tone of sustained invective, and always contains a prophecy of society's imminent downfall.
Posted by: cal Lash | September 06, 2011 at 01:08 PM
It's true that Jeremiah didn't have a "sahuaro." ;-)
Posted by: Rogue Columnist | September 06, 2011 at 01:14 PM
Jeremaid? didn't Robert Redford play him in a movie?
Posted by: azrebel | September 06, 2011 at 01:27 PM
Random memories:
There was sharp pushback when Skip Rimza wanted to rename Sky Harbor after Barry Goldwater. It must have taken him by surprise because he gave it up after a few days. Say what you will, we like that name.
There's never been a mass-casualty accident at or near Sky Harbor.
The old control tower in the picture was, according to local boosters, the largest stainless steel structure in the world when it was new.
In the 1950s, you could fly American Airlines to Bisbee/Douglas.
In the 1980s, the push to build a new airport between Phoenix and Tucson was spearheaded by John McCain. He had received significant campaign contributions from landowners where the airport would go. McCain's behavior during this period was, as some still recall, obnoxious.
In 1987, a Northwest flight from Detroit to Phoenix crashed after takeoff killing all on board except for a small girl. Among the casualties, Phoenix Suns center Nick Vanos, a player who was just starting to impress locals with his steadily improving skills.
There's only one flight from Sky Harbor to someplace outside North America (not counting Hawaii): British Airways daily flight to London-Heathrow. America West had nonstop service to Nagoya Japan back in the late '80s, early '90s. And Lufthansa flew nonstop to Frankfurt in the '90s.
Paul Coze, the artist who created the spectacular mural in Terminal 2 also designed the large Phoenix bird sculpture at Town and Country Shopping Center.
In the late 1980s, America West Airlines unsuccessfully petitioned the federal government to fly non-stop to Sydney.
In October 1960, JFK flew to Phoenix, arriving at 1:00 am in the morning. He gave a short campaign to an enthusiastic crowd at the old terminal. I remember standing next to Stewart Udall and Wade Church.
The Sky Chef restaurant at the old terminal was, during the late 50s, one of Phoenix's most popular. Air travel was sexy and exciting. Even if you didn't have a flight, the airport was definitely the place to go to.
Posted by: soleri | September 06, 2011 at 01:33 PM
Being a latter day "lung-er", I'm interested in the well-hidden air pollution effects of Sky Harbor and will see what the ADEQ will share.
Having it plunked down in the middle of Phoenix is both good news and bad news. After 40 years of navigating the place, I now feel pretty much out of place.
PS: I love Denver International vs the bungled-up eyesore that Stapleton became. But then, Denver understands transit.
Posted by: morecleanair | September 06, 2011 at 04:04 PM
"From one of the most beloved and bestselling authors in the English language"
I know to stay away when an author is described as such (in this case Bryson). Welcome back, Cal!
I remember Terminal 1 fondly. It and Terminal 2 are reminders, for me anyway, of what air travel used to be - exciting, formal, polite, efficient, trusting.
Posted by: eclecticdog | September 06, 2011 at 05:44 PM
You have to admit, there is something just "not right" that two airports like Sky Harbor and SF International are "under construction" for going on 50+ years. At some point you have to stick your finger in it and say, it's done, time to move on.
Back in the old days, getting on a plane in July in SF at 55 degrees and getting off the plane on the tarmac at Phoenix at 115 degrees, made you rethink your choice of the place you called home.
I used to fly to Denver from Phoenix regularly. One trip took me 14 hours. I believe it takes 12 hours to drive there.
Thanks to Gestapo Janet, I plan to never fly in an airplane again. My wife flies on business occasionally and I really enjoy dropping her off at the airport and then driving away without subjecting myself to the flying cattle business.
If God had meant for man to fly, he would have never created Southwest Airlines.
Posted by: azrebel | September 06, 2011 at 08:26 PM
FYI: Michael Chertoff and the former head of Homeland Security (french-cuffed, effete, Tom Ridge) pretty well created the pat-you-down gestapo. Nappy is blamed for stuff that was hatched and implemented before her.
Posted by: morecleanair | September 06, 2011 at 09:22 PM
Denver Airport is the best looking.
Except for the extraordinary waste of time and fuel to get there from downtown.
Some cabbies call it Nebraska International.
Posted by: LeftCoastDood | September 06, 2011 at 10:28 PM
Paul Coze was honorary French consul and hosted an annual Bastille day party where I had my first taste of serious wine (and under age at that.) I went out to see JFK there. I think that he was due for a stay in Phoenix but John-John was being born so he stopped over. His team devoted a lot of time to the west as part of the nomination strategy. Am proud to have gotten a handshake at the westward ho.
Posted by: Dawgzy | September 06, 2011 at 10:53 PM
"The Goldwater Terminal looks like a massive jail." - Rogue
The "Terminal" reminds me more of the euthanasia center (read, "Terminal") in Soylent Green.
Posted by: Rate Crimes | September 07, 2011 at 04:58 AM
Only in Arizona would the largest nuclear power plant in the nation be situated upwind of downtown and at the end of a runway.
Posted by: Rate Crimes | September 07, 2011 at 05:51 AM
One of the scariest nuclear situations sits 40 miles up the Hudson from NYC.
Most of Sky Harbor is ugly. The nicest area of the airport is the "train station" design in Terminal 4 (interior of the concourse). http://v7.cache7.c.bigcache.googleapis.com/static.panoramio.com/photos/original/47792501.jpg?redirect_counter=2
I am fond of the glass walkways that are visible from Sky Harbor Blvd but am unimpressed with the concrete walls in terminals 2, and 3. The soaring guideways for SkyTrain are awesome and if the "Super Terminal" gets built we will no longer have T2 and T3 will be incorporated into the new design. I hope they use more of the glass and train station elements from T4.
Posted by: phxSUNSfan | September 07, 2011 at 09:12 AM
I don't have anything to add to this post and great thread contributions, this spectacular detail and information, only...
My second flight was from Sky Harbor in the early '80's (the first was from Louisiana to NJ when I was unceremoniously booted from the military). Thus began nearly 2 decades of business travel to cities all around the US to-and-fro that hub (I recall 3 international trips as well, one a magical trip to Bombay - as it was spelled back then).
azrebel, thanks for mentioning that wall of heat when debarking from, well, just about anywhere else. I was in love with Phoenix in those years, and that blast furnace in my face was like a recurring Baptism, and is seared in my memory.
The evolution of Sky Harbor that Jon and others here detail, at least in the window that I experienced, oddly mirrored my growing disenchantment with a "professional" life. In the latter years I would find it shifting from a familiar place to an alien one and back again, depending on my mood. It holds some of my fondest memories, along with some darkest.
(One anecdote for cal: I once dipped my toe into a dating service and hooked up with a promising lady, only having to fly to Hawaii the next day. I became engaged to a local on that maiden visit to the islands.
My new friend was there to pick me up on arrival, only to angrily and silently stalk away and abandon me at the baggage pickup, after I sheepishly answered her query, "How was your trip?" One of those bittersweet memories - I shudder to think of what an evil cad I was in those days.)
I will never fly again. Partly carbon footprint, partly Security State - yet I remain wistful of those years of excess.
Posted by: Petro | September 07, 2011 at 09:23 AM
Pardon the disjointed memory and multiple posts, but my 1st impression of Sky Harbor Terminal One was December 1968 when sent to Phoenix for an "evaluation" trip on a soon-to-be corporate transfer. So, I've flown in/out of here for 44 years and the experiences were all downhill after the late 80's when customer service wound up in the porcelain fixture. Best commute was the 747 route between Phoenix and Chicago . . and even TWA business class to NYC. At a well-fed 6'3, I now need a shoe horn to fit. No bueno por ca ca!
Posted by: morecleanair | September 07, 2011 at 10:16 AM
I used to work doing airport transfers (Sky Harbor to local resorts by a van and vica versa) and it was enjoyable watching the reactions of new arrivals walking out of the airconditioned terminal into the blast furnace.
On the security state, even the cop wanna-bes are getting into the action:
http://www.salon.com/news/homeland_security/index.html?story=/politics/feature/2011/09/07/mallofamerica
Posted by: eclecticdog | September 07, 2011 at 11:39 AM
Electicdog, that would qualify as the funniest article I've read in a while if it weren't true! WTF...straight out of a conspiracy theorist novel.
Posted by: phxSUNSfan | September 07, 2011 at 12:45 PM
Paul Blart, Mall Homeland Security
Special assistant to Mr. Jan Nappy Napolitano
Posted by: azrebel | September 07, 2011 at 01:47 PM
Unload 130 passengers off a jet with two staircases,front and back - time 5 minutes.
Unload 130 passengers off a jet with one jetway - time 15 to 20 minutes.
Progress??
Posted by: azrebel | September 07, 2011 at 05:51 PM
Help! Explosives missing:
"The explosives — two half-pound orange-colored tubes set inside a blue, soft-sided Igloo container — were taken by an "unknown individual" Friday afternoon from Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport. Police had placed the container in the public area of at the airport's Terminal 4 to train police dogs."
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/n/a/2011/09/05/national/a163539D28.DTL
The fake real bombs are back, picked up on a sidewalk 8 miles away.
Posted by: AWinter | September 07, 2011 at 06:07 PM
Wrote "eclecticdog":
" 'From one of the most beloved and bestselling authors in the English language'
I know to stay away when an author is described as such (in this case Bryson)."
Good thinking: that way you also know to stay away from Shakespeare, Mark Twain, and, for that matter, anyone whose sales volume is sufficiently beyond the tepid to permit marketing hyperbole. (I believe Abbey's "Desert Solitaire" has sold more copies than Bryson's memoir of Cold War Des Moines; certainly enough to be described in such terms, should an enterprising publisher wish to do so.)
For those with a sense of humor who also want something informative about many of the subjects Mr. Talton favors -- postwar urbanization; how cars changed American cityscapes and habits at work and play; the Cold War and the nuclear arms race; demographics, race-relations, and social change; and baby-boomer nostalgia (tempered by the wry wit and realism of an educated perspective) -- I can recommend Bryson's "The Life and Times of the Thunderbolt Kid".
Bryson's memoir about growing up in 1950s and '60s Des Moines is marred in places by gratuitous vulgarity and certain other problems, but on balance should be quite entertaining to the aforementioned audience. The particular locale involve is used as a narrative microcosm of a broader world, reflections from which will surely resonate with and amuse many readers.
That the American born and bred Bryson is fairly widely traveled, having moved back and forth (twice now) between America and England, visited Europe and Australia, etc., doesn't strike me as being of critical relevance; but then, perhaps I lack the acute judgment of one who plans to spend his declining years in a cabbage patch outside Yuma, ogling fieldhands and endlessly rereading a narrow and ever diminishing circle of approved titles. (A word to the wise: there is nothing more appealing to the traditional, largely Roman Catholic subculture of migrant field laborers than the homosexual attentions of an elderly White man. You're a class act, sir: I salute you.)
If this seems a little snarky, here's some background: some weeks ago I noticed "cal Lash" reacting defensively to criticisms (made by other parties) of his spelling or grammar, then disappearing. In a friendly spirit after the fact, I offered what I imagined to be a personally tailored book recommendation to renew his "sense of inclusion"; and this is the thanks I get: a bizarre and vituperative rant upon his return. I don't appreciate the perverse response.
Posted by: Emil Pulsifer | September 07, 2011 at 08:09 PM
vituperative??????????????
I'm not even going to look the dang word up.
I'll just assume it means making a strong statement while wearing a black hat, drinking coffee and having a knowing smirk on your face.
Posted by: azrebel | September 07, 2011 at 09:28 PM
Oh, snap!
@Emil, I'm going to bask in the humour of your riposte, and enjoy it in that spirit. My choice.
Oh, man...
Posted by: Petro | September 07, 2011 at 09:52 PM
Emil, August heat has that effect on people. But, still, I'll read Twain and Abbey. Bryson is not happening.
Posted by: eclecticdog | September 08, 2011 at 11:48 AM
You ain't kidding eclec. I was out and about this morning and there are a bunch of real cranky folks running around. I normally carry a gun in the truck, but I may need to chamber a round and carry it in my lap. I just hope I don't shoot myself in the frenzy of a Santana song on the radio.
Oh, and since this post is about airports, I would like to add my rememberence that parked at the end of one of the runways is where I got my first opportunity to feel parts of my girlfriend for the first time. I've loved airplanes ever since.
Don't that beat being vitupative on a weekend night in the city? ( : - )
Posted by: azrebel | September 08, 2011 at 12:52 PM
Whoops. Forgot my "git a rope" line. Don't want to waste that one, so here it is:
...That the American born and bred Bryson is fairly widely traveled, having moved back and forth (twice now) between America and England, visited Europe and Australia, etc., doesn't strike me as being of critical relevance (much less cause for yelling "Git a rope!")...
"eclecticdog" wrote:
"But, still, I'll read Twain and Abbey. Bryson is not happening."
Why? Have you read the book in question? Have you ever read Bryson? (Admittedly, not every book he's written is charming and informative, but the same is true for most authors.) What's the source of your bias, other than a kind of knee-jerk iconoclasm based on a publisher's blurb? The ravings of a crazy, shit-kicking coot who bathes in lavender water?
Posted by: Emil Pulsifer | September 08, 2011 at 02:34 PM
TIME Emil, TIME! And I'm a slow reader compared to the bunch posting here!
azreb. Also witnessed heat-craziness this morning. While waiting for the mechanic to pull my car around I was entertained by a young couple fighting over a cell phone in the 99-Cent parking lot. No punches thrown, but the phone was! My memories of the 40th Street observation post pretty much involve just planes and lunch. IOW, I'm jealous.
Posted by: eclecticdog | September 08, 2011 at 03:43 PM
eclec,
planes and LUNCH??
I was there on a dinner date. Loved the menu !!!
Posted by: azrebel | September 08, 2011 at 03:53 PM
When I was a youngster it was really exciting to go to Sky Harbor. To greet or say goodbye to friends or relatives? No way! On the way over my brother and I would beg change from dad, and as soon as we hit SH Jack and I would head to the game room, where we would remain until picked up for the drive home.
Interestingly enough, I just moved into a condo a couple of miles from the airport, and can watch the flight path of jets probably about a half mile away as they descend to land there. I'm still awed that those massive structures can stay up in the air, and I find them fascinating.
Thanks for the memories Jon.
Posted by: wagonjak | September 08, 2011 at 07:58 PM
The obstruction of the view of the once "magnificent mural in the East Terminal" pictured in this article is one of the things that irks me the most about the lost Phoenix I was born in but left 20 years ago. Thanks for the photo. My husband finally can see it in all its glory and it helps shed some light on why I cuss like a sailor every year when we arrive at Sky Harbor to visit family.
The poorly conceived and constructed post 9/11 'security office' monstrosity that covers the mural today succinctly sums up the lack of sensitivity that rules my once fair city.
Posted by: Alwaysabride'smaidneveradonette | December 26, 2012 at 08:08 PM
Worked for Airwest/Hughes Airwest/Republic/Northwest at Sky Harbor from 1970 to 2010! Only job I ever had! Received Accounting degree from ASU but never considered other employment besides Customer Service for airline! Airport gets in your blood!!
Posted by: Tom | July 14, 2016 at 12:00 PM
My best memories of Sky Harbor were from the 60's when my father had to do a bit of business flying. We'd get there early and the special treat was playing the pinball machines!! I loved seeing the Phoenix mural and being able to go up on the observation deck to watch the planes. Good times.
Posted by: Jackie Thrasher | July 14, 2016 at 01:31 PM