to Isthmian Airways

Chronology and dating of the Isthmian timetables

I have never seen an Isthmian timetable with an identifiable date. However, the chronology of the five Isthmian timetables shown on this site is easy to ascertain (with the possible exception of timetable A) - there is enough information in the timetables to establish the order in which they were issued. This information also provides useful when trying to pin down the years they were issued. Nevertheless, the result is just an educated guess.

All figures in the table are based on information given in the timetables and relate to Day 1 in May 1929, when the service was inaugurated. To avoid any misinterpretation, I would like to stress that the figures for miles, flights and passengers are accumulated figures from 1929.

Time-
table
Total Number of miles flown
since May 1929
Total Number of flights
since May 1929
Total Number of passengers
since May 1929
One-way fare Round-trip fare Remarks/Additional info

A
no info
no info
no info
$10.00
$15.00
1929?

Departure times differ from all the others


B
"six times around the world"
(= approx. 144,000 - my estimate)
"landings every fifty miles" *)
(= approx. 2,880 - my estimate)
no info
$10.00
$15.00
1930?

C
> 384,000
> 5,000
> 19,000
$10.00
$15.00
1931?

D
no info
no info
> 45,000
$7.50
$12.00
1933?

Cover shows a United Fruit liner built in 1932


E
no info
no info
> 50,000
$7.50
$12.00
1933?

Cover shows a Grace liner built in 1932

*) Corresponding to the distance between Cristobal and Balboa, at the northern and southern ends of the canal respectively.

Timetable A may be the inaugural timetable of May 1929, or at least from that year. It has little information for comparison with the other timetables, except that departure times given are different from all the others (whose times are identical), especially at Balboa.

All timetables show six flights per day, with three in each direction. Assuming the same number of flights per day were operated from the start in May 1929, timetable B allows for 480 days of operation. Since there were also charter flights it is highly likely that this figure was lower. Still, I think it is fairly safe to assume that timetable B was issued sometime in 1930.

As for timetable C, I don't know why the number of miles flown seems to have increased much more than the number of flights when comparing with figures given in timetable B. Charter flights over longer distances? Since the fares are the same in both timetables, I assume timetable C wasn't issued later than 1931. When checking old OAGs you notice that fares in 1931 were often lower than in 1930 due to the depression, even more so in 1932 and 1933. However, with the much higher figures stated in timetable C, it couldn't have been issued in 1930. I settle for 1931 as the most likely year.

Timetables D and E, having much higher figures for the total number of passengers flown, were possibly issued in 1933. This is quite uncertain and they could be later. Both covers show passenger liners which, to the best of my knowledge, were built in 1932.

The airline ceased operations in mid-1936.

/Björn

If anyone has additional information in order to shed some light over the "dating mystery", please e-mail me (see below).

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Visit the website Bits & Pieces - History of Panama, consisting of stories compiled by Luis Celerier, which has an article about Isthmian Airways called The Little Airline That Could. (Please note that the article's reference to information found on this page is based on a misunderstanding. It says that this website calculates the number of passengers having used Isthmian during individual years. However, this website only gives accumulated figures based on the airline's own information, and as shown above, the exact years are not known.)

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This page last updated February 7, 2016.