Marquette Airlines

Marquette Airlines
Founded	11 January 1938 ; incorporated in Delaware
Commenced operations	14 May 1938
Ceased operations	15 August 1940 ; routes leased to TWA
Destinations	5
Headquarters	St. Louis, Missouri
Key people	Wink Kratz

Marquette Airlines was a brief-lived trunk air carrier, a United States scheduled airline that operated between St. Louis to Detroit from 1938 to 1940 before merging into Transcontinental & Western Air (TWA).

History

Marquette was founded in 1938 by Winston Weidner "Wink" Kratz, a 33-year-old pilot.^[2] It began scheduled service on the St. Louis - Cincinnati - Dayton - Toledo - Detroit route on May 14, 1938, with service four days a week, which soon expanded to six days a week, using Stinson Model A tri-motor aircraft.^[3]^[4]^[1] Marquette's line connected with the coast-to-coast route of TWA at St. Louis and Dayton. TWA saw the airline as a potential competitor and opposed Marquette's application for an operating certificate.^[2] However, the Civil Aeronautics Authority (CAA) certificated Marquette on July 18, 1939 under the grandfather statute (the CAA certificated airlines that could show a bona fide history of operation before the date of the Civil Aeronautics Act of 1938 that created the CAA).^[1]

TWA agreed to acquire Marquette in October 1939, subject to CAA approval.^[3] But between then and July 3, 1940, when the acquisition was denied, the airline regulatory functions of the CAA had become the Civil Aeronautics Board (CAB), which said, regarding TWA's application to purchase Marquette for US$350,000, that "it would be clearly adverse to the public interest" for Marquette's operating certificate "to be treated as if it were a speculative security."^[5]^[6] The CAB approved the acquisition December 18, 1940 for two reasons:

Reduced purchase price
TWA demonstrated that the route would be more valuable to itself than to Marquette by leasing the route from Marquette as of August 15, 1940. Ridership jumped dramatically, which allowed to the CAB to attribute the purchase price to something other than just the speculative value of the Marquette certificate^[7]^[8]

TWA operation of the route allowed TWA to serve Cincinnati and Detroit for the first time, and offer service from Cincinnati to Pittsburgh and New York.^[9]^[10] TWA replaced Marquette's Stinson trimotors with newer Douglas DC-2s.^[10] The CAB announced on October 18, 1941, that TWA could formally acquire Marquette, by which time the airlines were merged in all but name.^[11]

Tata Sons Ltd., the predecessor of Air India, acquired five of Marquette's Stinson aircraft in 1941 following the requisition of its larger aircraft for war purposes.^[12]

Destinations

As shown in historical timetables:^[13]

References

^ ^a ^b ^c ^d "Marquette Airlines, Inc.—Certificate of Public Convenience and Necessity". Civil Aeronautics Authority Reports. 1. Civil Aeronautics Authority: 301–311. February 1939 – July 1940. hdl:2027/uc1.b2938502.{{cite journal}}: CS1 maint: date format (link)
^ ^a ^b "CARRIERS: Dudes' Deal". Time. 1939-10-23. ISSN 0040-781X. Retrieved 2021-05-21.
^ ^a ^b "New St. Louis-Cincinnati-Detroit Airline In Prospect If Sale of Marquette Airlines Is Approved By Civil Aeronautics Authority". The Cincinnati Enquirer. October 15, 1939.
^ The 1939 Aircraft Year Book (PDF) (Report). Aeronautical Chamber of Commerce of America. 1939. p. 200.
^ "Air Line Merger Is Barred". The New York Times. New York City. Associated Press. July 4, 1940. "It would be clearly adverse to the public interest to allow a certificate of convenience and necessity to be treated as if it were a speculative security, to be sold by the holder to the highest bidder," the authority said.
^ "Acquisition of Marquette by TWA". Civil Aeronautics Board Reports. 2. Civil Aeronautics Board: 1–15. July 1940 – August 1941. hdl:2027/uc1.b2938503.{{cite journal}}: CS1 maint: date format (link)
^ Highsaw, Jr., James L. (May 1945). "Competition Under the Civil Aeronautics Act". Louisiana Law Review. 6: 161.
^ "Acquisition of Marquette by TWA". Civil Aeronautics Board Reports. 2. Civil Aeronautics Board: 409–424. July 1940 – August 1941. hdl:2027/uc1.b2938503.{{cite journal}}: CS1 maint: date format (link)
^ "Service Is To Be Doubled By Airline In Cincinnati". The Cincinnati Enquirer. March 23, 1941.
^ ^a ^b "Open Marquette Route Service". The TWA Skyliner. August 15, 1940.
^ "TWA to Acquire Marquette Airlines". Detroit Evening Times. October 18, 1941.
^ Wickstead, Maurice (2016-05-04). "Air-India Part 1". Airways Magazine. Retrieved 2021-05-21.
^ "Marquette (USA) timetables". timetableimages.com.