Opinions?

Bring Back the Stewardesses
by Robert Coram Jun 16 09


The biggest airline in the world, Atlanta’s own Delta Airlines, is in serious trouble: a $125 million hit this quarter, reduction of system capacity by ten per cent this year, and the loss of 8,000 jobs in the past 12 months. But I know how to fix all this and, at the same time, advance western civilization: bring back the stewardesses and impose on them an upper age limit of 30.

One of the most bizarre marketing ploys in history was when the airlines dropped “stewardess” and picked up “flight attendant.” It seems that “stewardess” was demeaning and that “flight attendant” more professional. The job did not change, only the attitude. Think nose dive. And by the way, how do you attend a flight?

Stewardesses were attractive women in their twenties.



Many were from small towns and believed that flying was the greatest job imaginable. They could sashay up an aisle in their high heels and tight skirts and the men onboard wouldn’t have noticed if the pilot performed three loops, two snap rolls, and a hammerhead stall. Stewardesses brought sparkle and joie de vivre to their work. They laughed and joked with passengers and did not take themselves too seriously. The job made it all worthwhile and they usually were married and gone before they were 30.

Stewardesses were trained in emergency procedures but had enough sense to know they could fly for years and never use the training; they were airborne waitresses and their job was to be bright and perky and to take the passengers’ minds off flying. That was okay. They loved their work.
They loved their work.

Then they became flight attendants. The twenty-somethings became waspish grandmothers more concerned with where they are going to shop when the plane lands rather than with service to passengers.




They go into the galley and read newspapers and chit-chat with each other. And the real reason there are fewer flight attendants than there were stewardesses is not because airlines are downsizing crews, but because today’s flight attendants usually are big ole girls and a jet aircraft can carry only so much weight.

In recent years my work has necessitated extensive air travel and I have learned a little about flight attendants. First, I don’t know about all airlines, but on Thai Airways, British Airways and Lufthansa, I saw no vinegary flight attendants, I saw stewardesses.

Second, if you fly to a relatively exotic location, say Hawaii or Bangkok, you can be assured that the most senior flight attendants (read, the oldest, the most burned out, the most burned out) will be aboard. Nine hours-plus in the air does not improve their dispositions.

Three, if you are in an aisle seat, the closer you sit to the front of the aircraft, the greater the danger of being maimed by a flight attendant. These dreadnoughts come up the aisle like a battleship pushing through the Panama Canal. By the time they reach the front of the cabin they have worked up a full head of steam, and in their wake, shoulders, elbows, arms, and knees are knocked aside like rowboats.

A moment before impact there is a half-second warning that sounds like an intermittent chain saw. This is the rasping sound of oversized thighs packed into too-small pantyhose. If you don’t move quickly, a hip the size of Rhode Island will do the moving for you.

Today’s flight attendants have forgotten how to smile. But wait! Maybe this is because they trowel on so much makeup that they are unable to smile.

They complain about the rudeness of passengers yet they think serving food or drink is beneath them, something to do in a hurried fashion so they can rush back to the galley and talk about the merits of Weight Watchers and Jenny Craig. The dark mood of the flight attendants, like their Wal-Mart perfume, settles over passenger cabins like a miasma of gloom. It is little wonder that passengers are so ill-tempered. Being cooped up inside a confined space with these harridans would curdle milk.

Stewardesses were sexy. Very few flight attendants have enough sex appeal to budge a hermit off a rock ledge.

Flight attendants may work themselves into a lather over such an assessment. They want you to believe they are highly trained personnel ever alert for nuclear weapons or l@ser beams from outer space; that their medical skills enable them to cope with everything from tennis elbow to a prolapsed uterus; maybe even brain surgery.

Right. In the meantime, could you please bring me a drink without spilling it?




Bringing back the stewardesses will do nothing about crowded flights, diminished service, late arrivals, and heightened security. But it will make all those more palatable to business travelers, many of whom are men, and who are the largest single revenue source for the airlines.

Let it not come as a surprise that for middle-aged businessmen, being waited on by a young woman is preferable to being waited on by the wicked witch of the west.

Thus, contrary to what you have been thinking, my suggestions about stewardesses are not sexist drivel. I’m talking good business practices.

Air travel will never again be the great adventure it once was. But stewardesses can make us feel better about it. Young, blonde, smiling stewardesses will make air travel more endurable.

Hey, Delta, are you listening? Bring back the stewardesses.