PAUL LENGELLE (1908-1993)

1971: CONTINENTAL AIRLINES. 1964.

40x24 1/4 inches, 101 1/2x61 1/2 cm.
Condition A: minor abrasions at edges.

In the years following World War II the possibility of comerical supersonic aviation began to take hold. In the early 1960s 18 different airline companies, including Continental, placed non-binding orders to add the airship to their existing fleets. In 1963 Continental ordered three of the aircraft. This 1964 poster presents those aircraft, as the would appear 7 years in the future, bearing the Continental "Golden Jet" livery, with gold tail and thin gold pinstrips along the fuselage. Adding to this futuristic projection their envisioned fleet is presented beneath the space age, Los Angeles Airport Theme Building, equally as modernistic as the vessels themselves. Continental Airlines moved their corporate headquarters to Los Angeles in 1963. The Theme Building opened in 1961 a year prior to its east coast cousin, Eero Saarinen's TWA Flight Center, which opened at New York's JFK airport in 1962. Ultimately, all the orders for Concordes were canceled, except for Air France and British Airways, the only airlines to succesfully operate the Concorde commercially. Continental's poster represented an aviation dream that never came to fruition for the company.