December 4, 1991: Pan American Airways goes out of business. So much for one of America's airborne "flag carriers."
It was founded on March 14, 1927 in Key West, Florida, by U.S. Army Air Corps officers Henry "Hap" Arnold, Carl Spaatz and John Jouett. Arnold would go on to become a 5-Star General of the U.S. Army, and, following the U.S. Air Force's separation from the Army in 1947, the only 5-Star General it has ever had.
Pan Am outgrew its role as a mail carrier, and in 1929, it began flying passengers up and down the Americas, North and South. In 1937, Pan Am Clipper planes began service to Europe. On March 7, 1963, the 808-foot-high, 59-story Pan Am Building opened in Midtown Manhattan. On February 7, 1964, a Pan Am Boeing 727-321, Clipper Defiance, took The Beatles from Heathrow International Airport in London to the newly-renamed John F. Kennedy International Airport in New York. In 1966, Pan Am peaked at 6.7 million passengers, going to 86 countries, and billed itself as "the World's Most Experienced Airline."
Director Stanley Kubrick chose Pan Am as the brand for the "Space Clipper" taking passengers to the Moon in his 1968 film 2001: A Space Odyssey. No one had any idea that, in 2001, Pan Am would no longer exist, or that Americans wouldn't be going to the Moon -- or that the most prominent use of American airliners that year would be for terrorism. And in 1982, the film Blade Runner, set in 2019, showed ads for Pan Am in downtown Los Angeles.
The golden age ended with the 1973 OPEC oil embargo. As the 1970s wore on, Pan Am sought mergers with American Airlines, Eastern Air Lines, Trans World Airlines (TWA) and United Airlines, but they were threatened with antitrust lawsuits from the federal government. In 1980, with no objection from the feds, they bought the bankrupt National Airlines. This turned out to be the dumbest thing they could have done, as they assumed National's debts, too.
In 1981, they sold the Intercontinental Hotel chain, and sold the Pan Am Building to Metropolitan Life Insurance Company (MetLife), though they kept their headquarters there. Pan Am sold their Pacific fleet and their hub at Tokyo-Narita International Airport in 1985. That same month, a Transport Workers Union (TWU) strike began, costing them a lot of money.
In 1987, they bought Ransome Airline, rebranded it as Pan Am Express, and turned it into a Northeast shuttle service: New York to Washington and New York to Boston. This didn't work, either. That same year, a takeover bid by a company whose executives included financier and eventual convicted sex criminal Jeffrey Epstein failed. The bombing of Pan Am Flight 103 in 1988 was a blow from which they never recovered. They tried to buy Northwest Airlines in 1989, but failed.
The airline's doom came with the rising oil costs of the Persian Gulf War of 1990-91. Delta Airlines bought Pan Am out, and phased the name out on December 4, 1991. Eastern, in operation since 1926, had also shut down that year, on January 18, its assets split between purchases by American Airlines and Continental Airlines.
In 1993, MetLife renamed the Pan Am Building the MetLife Building, even though there were already 2 other buildings with that name in Manhattan. The building has now had the MetLife name longer than the Pan Am name.
In 2011, ABC began broadcasting the drama series Pan Am, set in 1963, and based around pilots and flight attendants for the airline. Despite starring Christina Ricci and an as-yet-unknown-in-America Margot Robbie, the show failed to tap into the nostalgia for 1960s naughtiness that made AMC's Mad Men popular, was grounded after just 14 episodes.
In 2022, Pan Am's historical records and trademarks were acquired by CSX Corporation, which also holds the rights to such defunct companies as the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad (B&O), the Chesapeake and Ohio Railway (C&O or "Chessie System"), the Seaboard Coast Line Railroad, and the Louisville and Nashville Railroad (L&N).
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December 4, 1991 was a Wednesday. Reality Winner, the Air Force officer imprisoned for leaking information about Russian interference in the 2016 Presidential election, was born on this day.
Baseball was out of season. Football was in midweek. There were 7 games played in the NBA:
* The Boston Celtics beat the Miami Heat, 124-97 at the Boston Garden.
* The Charlotte Hornets beat the Los Angeles Lakers, 124-106 at the Charlotte Coliseum.
* The Portland Trail Blazers beat the Orlando Magic, 124-115 at the Orlando Arena. Clyde Drexler led all scorers on the day with 34 points.
* The Phoenix Suns beat the Indiana Pacers, 114-108 at the Market Square Arena in Indianapolis.
* The Chicago Bulls beat the Cleveland Cavaliers, 108-102 at the Chicago Stadium.
* The Utah Jazz beat the Washington Bullets, 101-74 at the brand-new Delta Center in Salt Lake City, Utah.
* And the Los Angeles Clippers beat the San Antonio Spurs, 92-81 at the Los Angeles Memorial Sports Arena.
And there were 4 games in the NHL:
* The Vancouver Canucks beat the Montreal Canadiens, 3-0 at the Montreal Forum.
* The Toronto Maple Leafs beat the Hartford Whalers, 3-0 at the Hartford Civic Center (now the PeoplesBank Arena).
* The Minnesota North Stars beat the St. Louis Blues, 5-2 at the Metropolitan Sports Center in the Minneapolis suburb of Bloomington, Minnesota.
* And the Winnipeg Jets beat the Buffalo Sabres, 5-4 at the Winnipeg Arena.
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