Memories of a Sky Goddess
By Kathy MacKenzie, For The Mountain Times
When I started flying in 1969, Continental had the greatest uniform – I called it the Jackie Kennedy. A simple short sleeved black dress with a waist jacket and gold buttons. A red hat, white gloves and pearls completed the uniform. Pretty swanky, and I felt beautiful wearing it. We had very strict rules! Must wear a girdle and a push up bra. A snap on our fannies confirmed the girdle – the push up bra was a bit harder to confirm. (obviously male flight attendants were not yet hired). The uniform must be worn in its entirety in all weather. Once, when boarding with stairs in Burbank in sweltering heat, I chose to forgo the jacket, never expecting my SEA supervisor to call me in after that flight for insubordination. As I explained to Jeff (a woman) it was over a hundred degrees. I explained it was simply too hot. I did win that fight because rules concerning the jacket were relaxed a bit in very hot weather.
Males were hired in the early 1970s. Before then, we gals were forced to share rooms on layovers. It was terrible to wake up to cigarette smoke from a fellow flight attendant. Or one who brought her own coffee maker and brewed coffee in the bathroom in the middle of the night. Even worse was awakening to my “roommate” having sex with our male DPS/purser. All true stories. Thankfully, when males were hired, we all got our own rooms.
Some uniforms were military looking, some just plain ugly. One we called the meatball dress made with a cheap cream colored silk with big round logos all over and a waist tie. Ugh. Another year, another uniform came in two colors we all hated, but we could wear either. One orange and one bright yellow. I never wore the hat that came with that doozie. Double ugly. We had a two-piece number with red hot pants complete with a zip on zip off skirt worn with either red patent leather block heels or white gogo boots. We could wear the one piece hot pants with no skirt. Talk about disco sky sluts! Also that year I won the award for best legs by the Operations guys in SEA. All the cookies I baked for them worked! We also had a horizontally-striped dress of orange, yellow, red, and white. I think the red heels completed that terrible look. By the mid 1980s, CAL finally produced a uniform we could all be proud to wear. Lots of tan and dark brown that we could wear with brown boots, a vest and a midi skirt. It was fun picketing for more pay in front of Denver and Newark Airports fully clothed. One uniform I loved was a tan one with a straight skirt and jacket. Worn with a white blouse and scarf it looked great. My last uniform was navy blue with several choices.
Around 1985, CAL tried to require us all to learn a language within a year. That was scary and real. After losing a lawsuit they started hiring language speakers for most international flights. All the rules for weight and height we’d fought so long for went right out the window: if they spoke a needed language they could be short and overweight. It created a rift with “speakers” for a while. Then some speaker got the bright idea to create an actual language base for all speakers. That sure worked for the speakers, who all of a sudden could get Christmas off with two weeks seniority while the rest of us had to gain seniority for those special holidays. It lasted so long we all became friends.
I retired in 2015 just after my youngest sister died unexpectedly in Sydney. What used to be a favorite flight and layover time flying down under lost its appeal. Nothing in Sydney for me anymore. Continental awarded us “senior stews” a golden parachute and I jumped.
I loved my job, my layovers, and flying with close friends for 46 years – holding dance parties in the aft galley will forever be a favorite memory. With seniority, we could fly as often or as little as we chose. I miss that job! I’ll always miss it. Some of us agree we’d go back to it in a flying second.