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Gomer, Lucille, and Continental Airlines Flight 11

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Written by Scott Lamb

May 23, 9:09 AM

First it was Gomer. Then it was Lucy.

While watching TV classics on DVD with my sons—Gomer Pyle U.S.M.C. and The Lucille Ball Show—twice in the last week we saw episodes that revolved around the main character going to the airport and being on a plane . . . and getting into mischief.

In both episodes, the thing that stood out the most was the complete absence of any modern notion of airport security. I know that these shows were just sitcoms and not documentaries on airport security, but in the context of the shows, I think the sets were supposed to be realistic for their own time.

Gomer Pyle accidentally flew to Rome, without a ticket, and Lucille, “Mrs. Carmichael,” threw herself down the luggage chute to retrieve something out of her bag.

This got me thinking about the history of terrorism and hijacking, specifically as it relates to the airline industry. When did it all start?

I remembered that Hollywood established the “hijack the airplane” genre in the 1970s, until it ran its course with the 1980 spoof classic Airplane! So, the idea and fear that a commercial airplane could be hijacked must have been in the cultural consciousness by the late 1960s.

Then this morning, in my daily perusal of “this day in history” type of reading, I came across this Wikipedia article about “Continental Airlines Flight 11,” which was “the first sabotage of a commercial jet aircraft in passenger service.”

According to the article, passenger Thomas G. Doty carried dynamite on board the plane, which he exploded in the lavatory, bringing down the jet and killing all 45 passengers on a flight headed to Kansas City from Chicago. Doty had purchased a life insurance policy with the maximum benefit possible, and had recently been arrested for armed robbery.

This first instance of passenger service airplane terrorism happened on May 22, 1962.

No wonder Gomer and Lucille got away with their airline hijinks. Passenger airplanes were still means of transportation, not terror.

Topic: Culture, WorldMagBlog

Keywords: airplane, hijacking, terrorism, travel

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back to top7 Comments to “Gomer, Lucille, and Continental Airlines Flight 11”

BY Kim 05.23.09 AT 9:29 AM

Great article on how our lives have changed. When I was in college studying history, I wrote a paper on Why The Civil Rights Movement Could Only Work in the 1950’s and 1960’s. If segregation still existed and we were having the marches and protests that we had we would have gangland style shooting out in the streets. I wouldn’t be safe for anyone black or white. I think we were underneath kinder back then. I don’t know, just seems to me that the country was. Now we are politicly correct but at what cost. I would rather know on the surface that someone disagrees with me and is a racist or a terrorist or whatever than to have them be nice on the surface and hate so strongly on the inside.

I am also reasonably sure there is nothing new under the sun, but I think we as a people have become less trusting of our fellow man. Someone posted about obesity in children but said they lived in a neighborhood full of children and didn’t see any outside playing. How sad is that? We are afraid to let our children out of our sight. Last night my daughter had two friends over to spend the night. One of them suggested they go watch TV!!!! Absolutely not…there are three of you. Get outside and play. You have each other and you have daylight.
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BY Sawgunner 05.23.09 AT 9:31 AM

I still recall how my parents insisted we dress up for a mere trip to the airport. And for many years in my youth air travel–if you were the traveler–was a genuine “dress up” affair.
And of course today its been so trivialized that you see gals and guys barely dressed parading down the concourse. I think the insurance bomber was actually a case worked by Jimmy Stewart’s character in “The FBI Story”
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BY michelle 05.23.09 AT 9:37 AM

My dad liked to read big fat history books and even in the early years of aviation, flying involved a lot of waiting. So, he always carried his latest book.

On a flight to Florida in the early 1960’s, he settled himself in the back of the plane, picked up his latest hefty tome–I remember to this day what it looked like, two inches across with the title printed in big gold letters on the black spine.

The plane took off and people walked up and down the aisles, stopping near him and whispering, then continuing on. The stewardess gave him a long, searching look when she poured his coffee. More whispering. He read on.

Finally, the co-pilot came and asked him to step into the kitchen area with him. My dad said, “sure,” picked up his book and followed the official man to the back.

“Sir, I need to ask you your intentions. Several of the passengers are concerned.”

“About me?”

“The book you’re reading, sir. You don’t have a weapon, do you?”

My dad turned the volume over in his hands and started to laugh. The title: “CUBA.”
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BY steveaubrey 05.23.09 AT 10:22 AM

I’m thinking that Lucy may have gone down a luggage chute.
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BY Xion 05.23.09 AT 10:27 AM

#2 SawGunner I still recall how my parents insisted we dress up for a mere trip to the airport.

My parents used to dress up just to go downtown. We would dress up to fly as well. I worked for Delta Air Lines until 1995 and was always required to wear a suit and tie when I flew.
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BY Xion 05.23.09 AT 10:49 AM

When did it all start?

Apparently the first hijacking was in the 1930s. However, the terror of hijacking really entered our consciousness in the 1960’s and ’70s with the PLO and other Arab groups with political motives to gain international publicity.

The 9/11 attacks were partially political, i.e. Americans in Arab lands, but fundamentally that is based on a religious mandate from the Qur’an. Muslim terror knows no boundaries, whether targeting transportation or the energy sector or simply blowing innocent people to bits.

The difficulty of dealing with religiously motivated terror in the West is the inability to acknowledge or even mention the actual root cause. Instead of dealing with a religion on religious terms, we prefer to send armies. We prefer the death of our sons and daughters rather than address Islam head on.
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BY Victoria 05.23.09 AT 7:48 PM

Kim – 1

YOU POSTED: “Someone posted about obesity in children but said they lived in a neighborhood full of children and didn’t see any outside playing. How sad is that? We are afraid to let our children out of our sight.”

I posted on that subject “Clergy advocate health care reform” post #14 – however SAFETY IS NOT the issue at all, never even mentioned, we are not afraid to allow children to play outside. Where we live, children are safe, there is no reason to keep them in the house, even when it is early evening.

Post #14

“Look at all the obese/fat people in this country, this accounts for much illness – children aren’t eating properly, sugar and soft drinks are their fav food. When we were kids we ate normal food, it wasn’t filled with additives, nor did my mother let us have soft drinks, they were only for parties or special events. We were told to go outside and play, and that meant bikes, skates, climbintg trees, running, and games, none of us were over weight. This isn’t the case today. We have lots of children on our street, …. I haven’t observed any this week playing riding, etc., they are all most likely watching TV or playing on their computers.”

http://online.worldmag.com/2009/05/22/clergy-advocate-health-care-reform/#comments

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