FLORIDA AIRWAYS

In our series gone but not forgotten, here is another airline that was swallowed by history’s insatiable appetite, this airline is FLORIDA AIRWAYS which graced the skies of Florida from 1946 to 1949. Florida airways was founded by Thomas E. Gordon owner of Economy cab, Florida Aeronautical Supply Company as well as a 400-acre privately owned airport “CANNON MILLS” in Orlando Florida. 

Florida airways was born as Orlando Airlines. On March 28, 1946, the CAB issued a temporary certificate to operate intra-state services (route 75) within the state of Florida. Operations began on January 9, 1947 as Florida Airways with a fleet of Beech D18C.

beech 18 silhouette from wikipedia

The operations proved to be un-economical and extremely costly for the US tax payer. On March 7, 1949, the CAB denied the application

for the extension of the company’s temporary certificate beyond March 31, 1949. This decision doomed the airline since according to the CAB, the revenues generated by passenger transport were insufficient to operate without government subsidies as the cost of carrying mail by Florida Airways was extremely expensive $30c per mile versus a system wide cost of $6.74c coupled with ferocious competition from Eastern Airlines since the CAB allowed Eastern to operate to Gainesville and Ocala on its ATL-MCO run 2 cities that were extensively served by Florida Airways. . 

The company folded in March 1949 and its founder Tom. E. Gordon fought extremely hard to keep his company alive, he urged the CAB to be awarded Southern Airways route 98 which had not yet begun as the owner of Southern airways Frank W. Hulse had tremendous problems in finding investors and raising capital. Hulse pledged that his Southern flight No1: ATLANTA-GADSDEN-BIRMINGHAM-TUSCALOOSA-COLUMBUS-MEMPHIS will begin on June 10, 1949 as agreed with the CAB. When this door was closed, Gordon pleaded with the CAB to have a shot gun wedding with Southern Airways but to no avail. The route and city authorities granted by the CAB were as follow :

Jan 10, 1947: Orlando-Ocala-Gainesville-lake City-Tallahassee-Lake City-Gainesville-Ocala 

Feb 25, 1947: Gainesville-Jacksonville 

Mar25,1947:Jacksonville-St Augustine-Palatka-Leland-Sanford-Orlando-Sanford-Leland-Palatka-St Augustine. 

Mar4, 1948: Leesburg 

Apr 7, 1948: Perry 

FLORIDA AIRWAYS TIMETABLE DATED JULY 25 1947, FROM THE BJORN LARSSON COLLECTION @

www.timetableimages.com

 FLORIDA AIRWAYS TIMETABLE DATED APRIL 5 1948, FROM THE BJORN LARSSON COLLECTION @

www.timetableimages.com

STATISTICS AND MAPS

Thanks to the information found on the site www.timetableimages.com (Collection of Bjorn Larsson), we can have the following statistics and maps

FLORIDA AIRWAYS TT 25/07/1947 TT 15/04/1948

Destinations 10 12

Sectors 10 15

Network 818 km 961 km

FLORIDA AIRWAYS 1947 MAP

FLORIDA AIRWAYS 1948 MAP

From Jacksonville Eastern Airlines and Delta Airlines provided connecting flights to and from a lot of major cities as evidenced by the connecting flights map below.

CONNECTING MAP AT JACKSONVILLE-1948

Maps generated by the Great Circle Mapper - copyright © Karl L. Swartz.