LAX Celebrates 60 Years

     Bogart and Bergman may be long gone, along with the old passenger terminal that once served as backdrop for the famous airport scene in the movie Casablanca, but elsewhere the “usual suspects” will be in evidence as historic aircraft and big band music will help celebrate the 60th anniversary of airline service at Los Angeles International Airport, October 4.
     The Flight Path Museum in the LAX Imperial Terminal is putting up an event themed "The Fabulous Flying Forties".
     LAX will feature a reception and dinner beginning at 5:30.
     More than 300 guests are expected at the event, Flight Path’s tenth fundraising Gala. Reservations are available by calling (310)
215-5291.
     Worth mentioning is that another building quite similar in detail and execution at LAX to the original 1930’s passenger terminal still resides, although a bit lost in the development on the Imperial Cargo side of the airport.
     The facility once used as a hangar and declared a landmark in the late 1970’s was redeveloped into a cargo operation by DHL although all of the original exterior details remain.
     Vintage aircraft on display include two versions of the DC-3, mainstay of air travel in the 1940’s, and a Lockheed C-40, the military version of an aircraft used by Howard Hughes on a record-breaking round-the-world flight.
     Also on view will be recently acquired educational flight simulators, models of the new Boeing 787 "Dreamliner" and Airbus A-380 "super jumbo" aircraft, an expanded Tuskegee Airmen photo exhibit, and a new collection of airline uniforms.
     Nonprofit Flight Path, in cooperation with Los Angeles World Airports, the City agency that operates LAX, manages the museum.
     Flight Path is open Tuesday through Saturday, 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. in the LAX Imperial Terminal,
6661 W. Imperial Highway, on the south side of the airfield.
     Admission and parking are free. Information: (310) 215-5291.