Help on Republic Please?

frntvngd

Member
Aug 24, 2002
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www.usaviation.com
I need some help on one of my fave old airlines...
Aircraft type and ammount at time of NWA acquistion?
Any helpful destination info (hubs, focus cities, strong-holds)?
Services offered (First Class?, etc)
ANY info at all is appreciated.
Thanks
 
I'll give it my best shot without going and looking stuff up.

Aircraft:
757-200's
727-200's
MD-80s
DC-9's including 50s/30s/10s
Convair 580's
I don't know the exact numbers off the top of my head.

Hubs:
Detroit
Minneapolis
Memphis

They didn't really have any focus cities at the time of the NW takeover, but I would maybe say Milwaukee, they had a few non-hub point to point flights.

By this time, most smaller cities formerly flown by Southern/North Central/Hughes Airwest had been dropped, and the hundreds of point to point flights had been deleted.
 
In Oct 1986 this was the fleet:

6 757-2S7
18 727-200
39 DC-9-10
65 DC-9-30
28 DC-9-50
8 DC-9-82 ( MD82 )
9 CV-580 ( in service )
1 CV-580 ( executive configuration )
4 CV-580 ( in storage )

I have more detail if needed.
 
A few items on Republic off the top of my head (and for that reason some specifics might be off a tad)

RC formed in 1978 by merger between North Central and Southern. Hughes Airwest merged into the RC fold in 1980.

Very far-flung system. Here are approximate sizes and ranks of the many RC hubs and focus cities shortly after Hughes Airwest was merged in:

Flights per day & approximate rank:
DTW 80 (1)
MSP 70 (2)
ATL 60 (3)
MKE 60 (1)
MEM 60 (1)
PHX 55 (1)
ORD 50 (5)
LAS 30 (2)

They also flew a great deal of scattered routes left over from the growth spurts of the three individual airlines, such as Salt Lake-Orange County, Cincinnati-Philadelphia, and Denver-Tucson.

In an attempt to stop massive losses, the airline in the early 80's added routes from MSP, PHX, DTW, and MEM and made them more hub-like. Then in about 1983/84, they decided to put all their eggs in MSP, DTW and MEM. In a quick stroke, they dumped *every* route which did not serve MSP, DTW or MEM except GRB-ORD, BNA-ORD and MKE-LGA. And they finally made money.

The old Herman the Goose logo (original to the earliest days of Wiscosin Central, the start of North Central) was replaced with a very-80's livery using white, gray, navy and burgundy.

By the time of the NW purchase, ORD-BNA and then ORD-GRB were also gone, so the only domestic route not serving MSP, MEM or DTW was MKE-LGA (also served nonstop by NW). The RC name disappeared in October of 1986 (if I recall correctly)

To most everyone's surprise, NW *retained* the Convair 580's for a few years after the merger even though they had abundant code-share lift at their disposal. Those disappeared in late 88 or 89 if I remember correctly.
 
I forgot to mention that RC did ahve a business class product. I think it wsa first just on 72S and M80 aircraft, but eventually the D95 and D9S also got it. Only the DC9-10 and Convair 580's were all-coach.
 
[blockquote]
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On 9/15/2002 10:22:07 AM mturpiz wrote:

A few items on Republic off the top of my head (and for that reason some specifics might be off a tad)

RC formed in 1978 by merger between North Central and Southern. Hughes Airwest merged into the RC fold in 1980.

[/blockquote]

The correct date of the NC/SO merger was July 1, 1979.
RW was indeed absorbed into Republic in October of 1980.
 
[blockquote]
----------------
On 9/15/2002 10:22:07 AM mturpiz wrote:

The old Herman the Goose logo (original to the earliest days of Wiscosin Central, the start of North Central) was replaced with a very-80's livery using white, gray, navy and burgundy.

[/blockquote]

The short-lived, and quite aptly named, Mary Tyler Moore color scheme!
 
[blockquote]
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On 9/15/2002 12:24:50 PM mga707 wrote:
The short-lived, and quite aptly named, "Mary Tyler Moore" color scheme!

----------------
[/blockquote]


LOL! That's the perfect name for it! The typeface is exactly that from MTM. Does anyone know (a very non-airline question) what that typeface is called? I always refer to it as the type from the MTM show.

Thanks, btw, on the correction of NC/SO merge date. I seem to recall Southern starting MEM-MKE and MEM-MSP in 1978, but it was clearly Southern and not Republic. So they were probably engaged in '78 but the marriage clearly wasn't until '79.
 
When i lived in Las Vegas i loved those old Hughes Airwest commercials of being Top BananaIn The West! YES----YES-----YES--YES---YES LOL.
 
I believe the Convairs (at least five) ended up at GMAT (General Motors Air Transport) at DTW. GMAT doesn''t operate the Convairs now. I don''t know what became of them.

In FNT (Flint, MI), my flight school provided ground handling for all GMAT flights. I remember Convairs coming in/out of FNT for the Indy 500. The airplane would pick up FNT-area GM employees and fly them to IND, then back.
 
Here is what happened to the Convair 580's

c/n:
67 sold to Venezuela Linea Aérea de Transporte.
150 sold to Venezuela Linea Aérea de Transporte
61 sold to Venezuela Linea Aérea de Transporte
77 sold to Venezuela Linea Aérea de Transporte
55 sold to Venezuela Linea Aérea de Transporte
377 sold to Venezuela Linea Aérea de Transporte
13 sold to Venezuela Linea Aérea de Transporte
379* sold to Venezuela Linea Aérea de Transporte
All eight are stored and at least one (c/n 379) is now listed as derelict.

462 went to Resorts then Renown and has been scraped.

101 N4811C is derelict in Texas

60 N4805C is stored in El Paso and still belongs to NW.

390 was sold to Air Resorts and has been scraped

475 The last one N969N faired much better. It wound-up at Kelowna Flightcraft and was converted into a Super 580 and is active with Air Tahoma.



I have more info if you need it.