William A. Patterson
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William A. "Pat" Patterson (October 1899 — 1980) was the president of United Airlines from 1934 until 1966.
Patterson was born on a sugar plantation on Oahu, Hawaii. When Patterson was 13, his widowed mother moved to San Francisco, California, while he remained at Honolulu Military Academy. Not liking the academy, he decided to leave. He persuaded a captain to allow him to work on his ship in exchange for passage to San Francisco.
Instead of finishing high school in San Francisco, Patterson became an office worker at Wells Fargo bank, though he later attended night school. He became a teller and later a loan officer, where he became familiar with financial structures, particularly of the burgeoning airline industry. He left Wells Fargo in 1929 and moved to Seattle, Washington to be the assistant to the president of Boeing Airplane Company and Boeing Air Transport. Boeing Air Transport was one of four airlines that merged in 1931 to form United. That same year, Patterson moved to Chicago to become United's general manager.
Two years later, Patterson was promoted to vice president of United, and in 1934 he became the company's president. In 1963, when Patterson became United's CEO and chairman of the board, the airline had more than 30,000 employees.
Patterson is credited with starting the profession of flight attendant — he gave his approval to hire eight nurses to work as flight attendants on a three-month trial basis. On May 15, 1930, United became the first airline to use flight attendants — a practice that has since been adopted by every major airline. Patterson's daughter, Patti, briefly worked for American Airlines as a flight attendant. Patterson and C.R. Smith, the CEO of American, shared a friendly rivalry.
See also
American National Business Hall of Fame's bio of Patterson (http://www.anbhf.org/laureates/patterson.html)
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