bers of the Philadelphia Club of Advertising Women (all my plane could accommodate) to a national convention in Washington. The members simply preferred to go by air. At the time, I could not help contrasting their attitude with the reputation the ticket sellers had accorded women a year or two before.
To return to the airline, there were minor problems always cropping up, having to do with the comfort and convenience of passengers. I soon learned the truth of the old axiom that a pleased customer seldom takes the trouble to say he was well served—it is the disgruntled one who takes pen in hand and writes and writes and writes.
Temperatures in the planes were too high or too low; the bumpiness of the air was the Company’s fault. Periodically the matter of baggage came up. With a railroad where weight doesn’t count for much, the individual may have any number of bags and bundles. But in a plane thirty pounds, or one medium-sized piece of luggage, is the usual allowance unless excess is paid. Even then in a crowded plane the Department of Commerce limits must not be exceeded. (Just as on the ground one may not overload trucks on the highways.)
One day a man with thirteen pieces turned up. Maybe the number had nothing to do with it, but it proved bad luck for him as well as for us.
“Your excess charge for this will amount to just about another fare,” said the dispatcher who weighed it.
