'Pan American's new high-altitude fleet. Ready for 'top flight' to Rio and San Cristobal [Cristóbal, Panama]: the Comet [NC19910], the Rainbow [NC19902] and the Flying Cloud [centre] at Miami.' This was Pan Am's entire 'Strato-Clipper' fleet. Location assumed to be Municipal Airport (later Amelia Earhart Field) which the 307s had to use until the runways at Pan Am's 36th Street Airport (now MIA) were lengthened. Photo from: San Diego Air & Space Museum

NC19903 poses for the camera over Mount Rainier, Washington, before delivery to Pan Am in 1940. This early pressurised airliner, of which only 10 were built, was then deployed on the airline's South American routes. TWA used theirs for transcontinental services. After spending more than two decades at the Pima Air Museum, this aircraft is now preserved in the Smithsonian Udvar-Hazy Center at IAD. Obtained from PAA 60 years ago.