Ozark Air Lines During the '80's

Deregulation had changed the face of Ozark as the line continued to expand, reaching westward to Las Vegas in 1981 and San Diego a year later. During the same time frame, Norfolk. Cleveland and San Antonio became Ozark towns, and Florida destinations rose to six even as several small, traditional Ozark stops like Paducah and Mattoon were deleted from the timetable.

By 1983, total route-miles exceeded 35,000, with 109 departures a day from St Louis.

Things weren't all "in the green" for the company, as a strike by machinists shut down the airline for 28 days in May, 1980, but the route rebounded strongly, gaining it a favorable article in the 20 October, 1981 "Wall Street Journal". The strike also marked the end of propeller aircraft in Ozark's inventory as the remaining Fairchild FH-227Bs were sold off, many to European second-level airlines. Although Ozark initially used its DC-9s to pick up the turbo-prop's service, the higher cost of the full jet service led to an agreement in October, 1985 with third-level carrier Air Midwest to assume service to a number of the region's smaller airports with their Swearangin Metroliners under the "Ozark Midwest" banner.

The company's Douglas fleet swelled through the '80s as additional second-hand DC-9s arrived from a variety of sources. Four McDonnell-Douglas MD-82s, the stretched and improved successor to the DC-9, would arrive in 1984-85 as the last new aircraft purchased by Ozark.

Through the '80s Ozark competed against the "bigs" with a variety of marketing schemes, including a new, cleaner paint scheme for its aircraft in 1981. In 1984 the line introduced an actor portraying Mark Twain on some of its flights to share some of the rich local color from its Heartland area of service.

Over 35 years, Ozark had developed from a puddle-jumping local airline flying DC-3s to a coast-to-coast, DC-9 only operation centered in St Louis. The line was not destined to survive the decade however, and in early 1986 an agreement was cut to merge Ozark into Carl Ichan's TWA for $224M. In spite of monopoly concerns stated by the US Justice Department, (the combined lines would control 75% of the gates out of Lambert-St Louis Airport) the merger was approved. For better or worse, 4000 employees and 50 aircraft joined TWA on 26 October 1986, and one of the more colorful local airlines in America came to an end.

Rich, provided the following information about himself and how he became interested in our airline.
"I've been writing at the amateur level for over 20 years, and have over 15 articles printed so far in railroad historical and professional Navy journals. Most of my work has appeared in the Navy historical/professional journal "The Hook", which is published by the Tailhook Assoc. (yes, THAT Tailhook Association...).
I'm not from the region originally, but went to Mizzou 1974-78, met my wife there, and have taken the Kansas City area as my adopted home since then. OZ was the "home line" at Columbia, so that's why it still interests me. I only wish I'd spent a lot more time shooting pictures down there! I spent 16 years in the Navy flying EA-6B Prowlers, and have lived in the Northern Virginia area since 1995 only because that's where the job is. I work in the Pentagon, where I have access to the library and back issues of "Aviation Week" and "Wall Street Journal", which has allowed me to develop a surprisingly large file on Ozark.

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