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   Vol. 14  No. 85
Monday October 26, 2015

Maureen O'Hara: A Life Well Lived

Maureen O'Hara

      My friend, the movie star Maureen O’Hara, died on Saturday, October 24, at age 95. She passed away peacefully in her sleep at her home in Boise, Idaho.
      Maureen made lots of movies—in fact, she was probably in more hits than anyone else of her time. Her notable movies include How Green Was My Valley, Miracle on 34th Street, The Quiet Man, and scores more.
     She was a real beauty, body and soul.

Travels With Charlie

Maureen and Charlie     While we of course knew her film oeuvre, we knew her best from aviation circles. She was married to Charlie Blair Jr., the former chief pilot at Pan Am and aviator extraordinaire who once flew a P51 Mustang from New York to Europe. If memory serves, he still holds the speed record for a single-engine piston aircraft flight across the pond.
     Charlie and Maureen started up a flying boat airline called Antilles Air Boats and flew schedules around the Caribbean for many years.
     They also secured the last big 1930s-era flying boat: a Sikorsky VS-44A, built in 1937, which once belonged to American Export Airlines. They flew the thing all the way across the Atlantic to Ireland.
     Charlie was killed in 1978 when a Grumman Goose he was piloting cartwheeled on landing near St. Croix.

First Female Airline CEO

     Charlie’s problems may have been over in an instant, but Maureen was left in debt, with an airline to operate, and of course in shock at having lost the love of her life.
     As the first woman in the world to be the CEO of an operating scheduled airline, Maureen showed the skill and determination to not only operate the company, but also bring the business to profit. She eventually sold the airline off to another company, which operated the flying boat service on the Miami Causeway for many years.
     Maureen had Charlie’s beloved VS-44A sent back to Sikorsky in Connecticut, where it was lovingly restored. Today it sits in a place of pride at the New England Air Museum in Windsor Locks, Connecticut.

Luck Of The Irish

     Fast forward to 1980. I am sitting in my office at LaGuardia Field when suddenly the place is full of people from Foynes, Ireland.
     Foynes was at the dawn of trans-Atlantic air service—the first landfall by air from America—and was, up until the outbreak of WWII, where the Pan Am Clippers from New York first landed, bound for Southampton England.
     That day the Irish told me they want to start an air museum, so we spent a couple of days together. I took them out to Port Washington, where the first New York-to-Europe flights via Foynes began in 1939, brought them home for dinner, and called my friend, LaGuardia Airport Manager Tim Peirce for guidance on how we could help.
     Tim knew right away what to do and engineered to have our airport Kiwanis Club honor Maureen O’Hara at a gala black-tie dinner. The money raised would go to the Irish to start their museum.
     Maureen showed up, stayed late, attended the after party, stayed later, and was simply superb.
     All during the dinner I kept hounding Harris Herman, the Pan Am Shuttle boss at the time, to give up a pass so Maureen could fly to Boston to see her grandkids the next day.
     Of course, ever obliging, Harris took care of business.

About John Wayne

     The next morning at 0500 I jumped into the car and went over to the Pan Am Shuttle at the Marine Air Terminal at LaGuardia and ran up to the VIP hold room to turn up the heat, expecting Maureen for the 0730 take off.
     Thinking I should get some coffee, I headed toward Rocky’s place inside the MAT.
     All of a sudden I spotted a tall lady with bright red hair and knew at once it was Maureen.
     “Oh, it’s you,” we both said at the same time. I escorted her into the Pan Am lounge room.
     We sat and talked undisturbed for about 15 minutes. Stories unfolded of her time flying all over hell with Charlie, as an airline boss and life thereafter, and how glad she was to help the people from Foynes.
     Boldly, I asked her to tell me something about her frequent co-star in so many great movies, John Wayne. Bolder still, and perhaps pressing my Irish luck, I asked for something no one had ever been told.
     She made me promise not to repeat the following until after she was gone.
     “The last phone call from Duke,” Maureen said, “was just toward the end, when he sounded very hollow and weak.
     “He said to me: ‘Why did this happen to me?’
     “All these years later, I still think about that call often, and how his voice sounded—that big, strapping man who was so strong and full of life.
     “He dragged me around like a rag doll in The Quiet Man and here he was, stricken and weak and wondering ‘why me?’”
     The look on Maureen’s face was sympathetic, thoughtful, and resolute.

One Strong Lady

     Effusive, talented people fluttered around Maureen like moths silently serenading a lamppost. I learned after a few face-to-face visits with her that she was stronger than most anyone.
     Moments after talking in such sweet, honest, emotional terms about “Duke,” dear Tim showed up with a half-dozen ramp rats and Maureen was off to the races, signing autographs and shaking hands all around.
     I must admit, along the trail of my 74 years, it has been my privilege to meet and even get to know some pretty special people.
     But for the few months we worked to raise money for what is now the wonderful Irish National Air Museum in Foynes, I always think back to how wonderful and down to earth was the high-flying lady, Maureen O’Hara.
     We thought about her again in 2013 when the St. Thomas (Virgin Islands) seaplane terminal was formally dedicated to Capt. Charles F. Blair Jr.
     Charlie was great, and Maureen kept his life and legend alive long enough for the rest of the world to catch up.
     She was a very strong lady.

Fond Farewell

     Now, these many years later, we say goodbye to a life well lived with a lovely 95th birthday tribute and J.R.R. Tolkien’s words:
     “May the wind under your wings bear you where the sun sails and the moon walks.”
    Maureen O'Hara Video
Geoffrey

 

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