BRANIFF INTERNATIONAL
OBITUARY
While our hearts are saddened our hope is strong because for a time we had her in our lives....
Miss Jean Duncan
January 11, 1926 – October 10, 2021
Miss Jean Duncan, Braniff International's legendary flight attendant manager has died. She was in the care of Beehive Hospice at the time of her passing. Miss Duncan had become ill this past week and succumbed to her short illness at 1PM Dallas, Texas, time, at her hospice home in Lewisville, Texas. She was 95 years old.
A Queen, a legend, a mark in time, never again equaled.
"Never in my life have I had the opportunity to meet someone as poised and as smart as Jean Duncan. Her gracious smile only grew brighter in all my privileged years of knowing and working with her."
Harding L. Lawrence, Chairman, Braniff International, 1980
A native of Corpus Christi, Texas, she was born on the Chapman Ranch, Texas, on January 11, 1926. Chapman Ranch is an unincorporated town in southeast Nueces County, created from 34,000 acres of the fabled King Ranch that were purchased by the Chapman Family in 1919. The community is 7 miles south of Corpus Christi, where Jean and her family, which included her mother Mrs. Eloise McIlvaney and her father William Dwight Duncan moved to from Chapman Ranch.
Jean, an only child, attended public school at Chapman Ranch where she completed her elementary education. When she was 10, her family moved to Corpus Christi, where she first attended Wynn Seals Junior High School. She attended Corpus Christi High School where she graduated in the early 1940s. Jean began attending her first two years of college at the local Del Mar Junior College in Corpus Christi.
She attended University of Texas and received a Bachelor of Science degree in home economics with a minor in education. Always drawn to service, Miss Duncan began teaching seventh graders at Robert Driscoll High School in Corpus Christi beginning in January 1947 through June 1951. She then moved to Austin, Texas, accepting a secretarial position with the Director of the Texas University Health Center. Jean held this position for two years before she discovered the mystique of flight that would take her around the world during a career that spanned nearly four decades.
On June 1, 1953, Jean Duncan was hired by Braniff Airways, Inc. She was employed as a flight hostess, continuing her life of service. She flew as a flight attendant for the Dallas-based carrier for the next six years. She was based in Dallas and flew on every route that Braniff operated at the time.
Jean's excellence as a Braniff hostess was honored on July 10, 1956, when she was awarded the airline's special "Star Hostess" wing for outstanding service in flight. The wing featured a diamond and a star, which was designed by Mr. Guy Carter, Jr., manager of passenger service for Braniff Airways.
On January 20, 1957, Miss Duncan was crowned the Queen of Valley Air Transportation. The special crowning took place at the grand opening of the plush new El Padre Resort Hotel, which was located at the south end of Padre Island, Texas. Thousands of well-wishers were on hand for the grand opening and Jean's crowning ceremony.
Miss Duncan then decided that she would like to continue teaching but at Braniff instead of in the public schools. She accepted a position in the hostess management department in January 1959, becoming a hostess training instructor. In only one year, she was promoted to supervisor of training in September 1960, with one instructor under her management.
Braniff entered the jet age in 1959 and the airline began growing at a rate that required the hiring of two additional hostess instructors by 1962 and as a result, Jean Duncan was again promoted to the position of manager of hostess training. By 1964, Miss Duncan was responsible for training approximately 200 new flight hostesses every year. She conducted periodic refresher courses for the 425 hostesses and pursers assigned to Braniff's four flight crew bases based on the US Mainland and in South America.
On September 1, 1963, Jean Duncan was aboard Braniff's luxurious new Boeing 707-227 El Dorado Super Jet when it traveled to her hometown of Corpus Christi, for Salute to Aviation Day. She assisted with Braniff's special exhibit, which was set up in the main lobby of the new Corpus Christi International Airport. The exhibit featured a display of the hostess uniforms worn by the company's hostesses during the past 26 years.
The stylish exhibit featured Braniff's first uniform, which was a Bolero-style suit that the airline's first hostesses wore when they were hired in the spring of 1937 to ensure passenger comfort on the company's new 14-passenger Douglas DC-2 twin-engine airliners. In addition, to the uniform display, large display photos of Braniff aircraft from 1928 to present day were also part of the unique exhibit.
A few days later on September 9, 1963, Jean Duncan sat down with Mademoiselle Magazine's Travel Editor Miss Frances Koltun to discuss the Braniff flight hostess. Jean delivered some of her greatest quotes during the interview:
"In fact, we actually encourage our hostesses to regard the plane as their home away from home."
"While we certainly want them to be smart and efficient, we also want them to be warm and personable. In short, we expect our young ladies to personify our company's Friendly Transportation slogan."
"Most of Braniff's passengers are business people – women, as well as men – who know, practice and expect efficient, friendly treatment."
"We teach our hostesses to imagine a passenger is her parent or close friend and then ask herself if she would want that person treated the way she is treating this passenger."
"Although all 112 seats on one of our giant Boeing 707s jets may be occupied, a Braniff hostess is expected to make each passenger feel she is on board to serve especially him. The hostess must forget herself and think only of her passengers."
"Braniff wants wholesome, hometown girl – the "best personality" type, rather than "most beautiful" specifically, an interesting enthusiastic and warm personality, a friendly individual and then combine this with as much beauty and physical attractiveness as possible. Maturity and good judgement, along with proper background and environment are paramount."
During her previous eleven years with the company, Jean had the opportunity to travel extensively throughout the United States, South America and Europe. She represented Braniff on many special assignments that included an international travel seminar in Brussels, Belgium. By 1968, Jean had been responsible for training more than three-fourths of Braniff's 800-plus US-based hostesses on the roster to date.
With the advent of the revolutionary End of the Plain Plane Campaign, which Braniff introduced the world to in November 1965, the company began growing by more than $100 million dollars a year in business. Jean Duncan knew that Braniff would need a larger standalone hostess college. Since 1965, the airline's hostess college was housed on the fifth and sixth floors of Blanton Tower office building at the entrance to Love Field. The airline was quickly outgrowing the Blanton space.
In 1967, Braniff International announced that it would construct a $2 million USD Hostess College in the Oaklawn Neighborhood of Dallas, less than 2 miles from Love Field. The new facility would contain all hostess training functions under one roof.
On January 5, 1968, Braniff International dedicated the new Hostess College located at the corner of Wycliff Avenue and the Dallas North Tollway. All Braniff hostess training took place at this new facility and the opening of the facility was celebrated with three days of fanfare. Braniff Chairman Harding L. Lawrence, accompanied by Dallas Mayor Erik Jonsson and Dallas Chamber of Commerce President Morris Hite, dedicated the facility at noontime. Mr. Lawrence presented a gold key to the new building to the Manager of Hostess Training Miss Jean Duncan to symbolize the golden opportunities that the new facility would provide to its students.
On July 10, 1969, John R. Kersey, Vice President Customer Service announced that Jean Duncan would again be promoted, this time to Manager of the new Hostess Base in Houston, Texas, which opened on August 1, 1969. Jean remained in this position until 1972, when she decided that she wanted to return to line flying. She truly loved serving and conversing with her passengers from all over Braniff's far-flung route map.
For the next ten years, Jean flew the line and often worked Braniff's daily nonstop Boeing 747 flight from Dallas to Honolulu. She also enjoyed serving on the airline's new routes across the Atlantic to London, Paris, Frankfurt, Amsterdam and Brussels and across the Pacific to Guam and Hong Kong, Seoul and Singapore.
On May 12, 1982, Jean Duncan was the senior flight attendant on the company's nonstop Boeing 747 flight from DFW Airport to Honolulu. While the massive 747 was flying over Los Angeles, California, a message was relayed to the Captain that Braniff had ceased all flight operations and that he needed to land in Los Angeles. He shrewdly declined and continued to take his passengers and crew to their final destination in Hawaii.
The Big Orange 747 was refueled and the flight returned nonstop to DFW Airport, where for the first time Jean Duncan and her passengers could see a colorful rainbow of Braniff jets, not taxiing and taking off as normal, but all parked in solemn rows seemingly asking why they weren't flying today. Everyone on the 747 that early morning of May 13, 1982, was asking themselves that same question.
With the touchdown of Flight 502, Braniff's last scheduled flight, Jean Duncan's nearly four decades of flying had come to an end as well. Jean quickly went to work for the Arthur Anderson accounting firm in Dallas. She chose not to return to Braniff's successor, Braniff, Inc., when it began flying again in March 1984. Instead, she remained with Arthur Anderson until she retired in 1997.
On September 10, 2016, Jean Duncan was awarded the Braniff Airways Foundation Hall of Fame Award for her dedication to the aviation and airline industry and for her work in ensuring that the history and legacy of Braniff Airways would always be preserved. She remarked that the day she received the award was one of the best days of her life.
Jean remained active in the Clipped B's, the Association of Retired Braniff International Flight Attendants. In 2017, while walking her beloved dog Bella, near her home in North Dallas, she fell and broke her hip. Never to be undone, she quickly recovered from the surgery and excelled during her physical therapy. However, she decided to leave Dallas, her home since 1953, to move to an assisted living facility in Flower Mound, Texas, where she remained until her death.
On October 10, 2021, Braniff Airways Foundation created a Find A Grave page for Jean, which can be accessed by clicking this link:
https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/232915416/jean-duncan
Additional photos and biographical information will be added over the coming weeks. Please sign the guest book and leave a flower in her honor.
"The flash of that smile, the tilt of her head, you knew she was a professional the minute you met her. What you didn't realize was you would become part of her vast extended family and that she would love you as a best friend, worry about you more than your Mother ever would and if you graduated from one of her classes she would never, ever forget you."
From Jean Duncan's tribute for her induction into the Braniff Airways Foundation Hall of Fame in 2016.
Braniff International
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A TRIBUTE TO JEAN DUNCAN
September 2016
It was 1952 and the phone rang in her apartment in Dallas Texas; someone from Braniff Airways wanted to know if she was interested in flying for the company? Her response was, "Well, I don't know, I will have to ask my Mom and Dad".
In that moment a Braniff Legend was born...! The flash of that smile, the tilt of her head, you knew she was a professional the minute you met her. What you didn't realize at the time was; you would become part of her vast extended family and that she would love you as a best friend, worry about you more than your Mother ever would… and if you had graduated from one of her classes she would never, ever forget you.
Jean Duncan, an only child, was born in Chapman Ranch Texas, a small town 17 miles south of Corpus Christi. Her Daddy was a farmer and a carpenter, her Mother was their homemaker. She attended school in Chapman Ranch through Junior High and graduated from CC High School. After graduation she finished two years of Junior College and then transferred to the University of Texas where she was graduated with a BA in 1948. For 3 years she taught Science, English and Math to the 7th-8th and 9th graders in Corpus.
After going through Hostess training, Jean was based in Dallas on January 1,1953 she flew on the line for six years, where she charmed every passenger, crew member or any other employee or individual that she happened to meet. In 1959 she was recruited to head up the Hostess training program; in 1967 she convinced the "Powers that Be" that Braniff truly needed a Training College and they agreed, the new building was built in1968. One of her more famous quotes the Flight Attendants remember from their training days was; "The only place a Hostess ever chews gum, is underneath the bed".
In 1969, her next assignment at Braniff was to open the new base in Houston, which she took on with as much love and efficiently as she did everything else. With the expansion of the airline routes growing so quickly, Jean got the feeling she was missing a lot of exciting times and made the decision to come back on the line and resume her flying career. She returned to the Dallas base and flew Domestic and International until that fateful day, May 12, 1982. She was the "Senior Mama" on the last flight back from Honolulu, Captained by Charlie Lamb, who famously told the dispatchers when they wanted him to return Fat Albert back to HNL, "negative, we are now at the point of no return". And so it was, that when flight 502 landed at DFW it was the end of Jean's flying career.
After the Braniff ceased operations, Jean worked for Arthur Anderson Accounting in Dallas and retired in 1997. She is now happily living in Dallas with her dog Bella and active in the Clipped Bee's.
For those of us who have had the pleasure of belonging to her extended family, we salute you Jean Duncan! We thank you for all you have done for us we can never repay you for what you have taught us, not only in the virtual classroom...but the classroom of life. God Bless you and Godspeed…
Clipped B's Association of Retired Braniff International Flight Attendants
From Jean Duncan's September 2016 induction into the Braniff Airways Foundation Hall of Fame
OBITUARY
While our hearts are saddened our hope is strong because for a time we had her in our lives....
Miss Jean Duncan
January 11, 1926 – October 10, 2021
Miss Jean Duncan, Braniff International's legendary flight attendant manager has died. She was in the care of Beehive Hospice at the time of her passing. Miss Duncan had become ill this past week and succumbed to her short illness at 1PM Dallas, Texas, time, at her hospice home in Lewisville, Texas. She was 95 years old.
A Queen, a legend, a mark in time, never again equaled.
"Never in my life have I had the opportunity to meet someone as poised and as smart as Jean Duncan. Her gracious smile only grew brighter in all my privileged years of knowing and working with her."
Harding L. Lawrence, Chairman, Braniff International, 1980
A native of Corpus Christi, Texas, she was born on the Chapman Ranch, Texas, on January 11, 1926. Chapman Ranch is an unincorporated town in southeast Nueces County, created from 34,000 acres of the fabled King Ranch that were purchased by the Chapman Family in 1919. The community is 7 miles south of Corpus Christi, where Jean and her family, which included her mother Mrs. Eloise McIlvaney and her father William Dwight Duncan moved to from Chapman Ranch.
Jean, an only child, attended public school at Chapman Ranch where she completed her elementary education. When she was 10, her family moved to Corpus Christi, where she first attended Wynn Seals Junior High School. She attended Corpus Christi High School where she graduated in the early 1940s. Jean began attending her first two years of college at the local Del Mar Junior College in Corpus Christi.
She attended University of Texas and received a Bachelor of Science degree in home economics with a minor in education. Always drawn to service, Miss Duncan began teaching seventh graders at Robert Driscoll High School in Corpus Christi beginning in January 1947 through June 1951. She then moved to Austin, Texas, accepting a secretarial position with the Director of the Texas University Health Center. Jean held this position for two years before she discovered the mystique of flight that would take her around the world during a career that spanned nearly four decades.
On June 1, 1953, Jean Duncan was hired by Braniff Airways, Inc. She was employed as a flight hostess, continuing her life of service. She flew as a flight attendant for the Dallas-based carrier for the next six years. She was based in Dallas and flew on every route that Braniff operated at the time.
Jean's excellence as a Braniff hostess was honored on July 10, 1956, when she was awarded the airline's special "Star Hostess" wing for outstanding service in flight. The wing featured a diamond and a star, which was designed by Mr. Guy Carter, Jr., manager of passenger service for Braniff Airways.
On January 20, 1957, Miss Duncan was crowned the Queen of Valley Air Transportation. The special crowning took place at the grand opening of the plush new El Padre Resort Hotel, which was located at the south end of Padre Island, Texas. Thousands of well-wishers were on hand for the grand opening and Jean's crowning ceremony.
Miss Duncan then decided that she would like to continue teaching but at Braniff instead of in the public schools. She accepted a position in the hostess management department in January 1959, becoming a hostess training instructor. In only one year, she was promoted to supervisor of training in September 1960, with one instructor under her management.
Braniff entered the jet age in 1959 and the airline began growing at a rate that required the hiring of two additional hostess instructors by 1962 and as a result, Jean Duncan was again promoted to the position of manager of hostess training. By 1964, Miss Duncan was responsible for training approximately 200 new flight hostesses every year. She conducted periodic refresher courses for the 425 hostesses and pursers assigned to Braniff's four flight crew bases based on the US Mainland and in South America.
On September 1, 1963, Jean Duncan was aboard Braniff's luxurious new Boeing 707-227 El Dorado Super Jet when it traveled to her hometown of Corpus Christi, for Salute to Aviation Day. She assisted with Braniff's special exhibit, which was set up in the main lobby of the new Corpus Christi International Airport. The exhibit featured a display of the hostess uniforms worn by the company's hostesses during the past 26 years.
The stylish exhibit featured Braniff's first uniform, which was a Bolero-style suit that the airline's first hostesses wore when they were hired in the spring of 1937 to ensure passenger comfort on the company's new 14-passenger Douglas DC-2 twin-engine airliners. In addition, to the uniform display, large display photos of Braniff aircraft from 1928 to present day were also part of the unique exhibit.
A few days later on September 9, 1963, Jean Duncan sat down with Mademoiselle Magazine's Travel Editor Miss Frances Koltun to discuss the Braniff flight hostess. Jean delivered some of her greatest quotes during the interview:
"In fact, we actually encourage our hostesses to regard the plane as their home away from home."
"While we certainly want them to be smart and efficient, we also want them to be warm and personable. In short, we expect our young ladies to personify our company's Friendly Transportation slogan."
"Most of Braniff's passengers are business people – women, as well as men – who know, practice and expect efficient, friendly treatment."
"We teach our hostesses to imagine a passenger is her parent or close friend and then ask herself if she would want that person treated the way she is treating this passenger."
"Although all 112 seats on one of our giant Boeing 707s jets may be occupied, a Braniff hostess is expected to make each passenger feel she is on board to serve especially him. The hostess must forget herself and think only of her passengers."
"Braniff wants wholesome, hometown girl – the "best personality" type, rather than "most beautiful" specifically, an interesting enthusiastic and warm personality, a friendly individual and then combine this with as much beauty and physical attractiveness as possible. Maturity and good judgement, along with proper background and environment are paramount."
During her previous eleven years with the company, Jean had the opportunity to travel extensively throughout the United States, South America and Europe. She represented Braniff on many special assignments that included an international travel seminar in Brussels, Belgium. By 1968, Jean had been responsible for training more than three-fourths of Braniff's 800-plus US-based hostesses on the roster to date.
With the advent of the revolutionary End of the Plain Plane Campaign, which Braniff introduced the world to in November 1965, the company began growing by more than $100 million dollars a year in business. Jean Duncan knew that Braniff would need a larger standalone hostess college. Since 1965, the airline's hostess college was housed on the fifth and sixth floors of Blanton Tower office building at the entrance to Love Field. The airline was quickly outgrowing the Blanton space.
In 1967, Braniff International announced that it would construct a $2 million USD Hostess College in the Oaklawn Neighborhood of Dallas, less than 2 miles from Love Field. The new facility would contain all hostess training functions under one roof.
On January 5, 1968, Braniff International dedicated the new Hostess College located at the corner of Wycliff Avenue and the Dallas North Tollway. All Braniff hostess training took place at this new facility and the opening of the facility was celebrated with three days of fanfare. Braniff Chairman Harding L. Lawrence, accompanied by Dallas Mayor Erik Jonsson and Dallas Chamber of Commerce President Morris Hite, dedicated the facility at noontime. Mr. Lawrence presented a gold key to the new building to the Manager of Hostess Training Miss Jean Duncan to symbolize the golden opportunities that the new facility would provide to its students.
On July 10, 1969, John R. Kersey, Vice President Customer Service announced that Jean Duncan would again be promoted, this time to Manager of the new Hostess Base in Houston, Texas, which opened on August 1, 1969. Jean remained in this position until 1972, when she decided that she wanted to return to line flying. She truly loved serving and conversing with her passengers from all over Braniff's far-flung route map.
For the next ten years, Jean flew the line and often worked Braniff's daily nonstop Boeing 747 flight from Dallas to Honolulu. She also enjoyed serving on the airline's new routes across the Atlantic to London, Paris, Frankfurt, Amsterdam and Brussels and across the Pacific to Guam and Hong Kong, Seoul and Singapore.
On May 12, 1982, Jean Duncan was the senior flight attendant on the company's nonstop Boeing 747 flight from DFW Airport to Honolulu. While the massive 747 was flying over Los Angeles, California, a message was relayed to the Captain that Braniff had ceased all flight operations and that he needed to land in Los Angeles. He shrewdly declined and continued to take his passengers and crew to their final destination in Hawaii.
The Big Orange 747 was refueled and the flight returned nonstop to DFW Airport, where for the first time Jean Duncan and her passengers could see a colorful rainbow of Braniff jets, not taxiing and taking off as normal, but all parked in solemn rows seemingly asking why they weren't flying today. Everyone on the 747 that early morning of May 13, 1982, was asking themselves that same question.
With the touchdown of Flight 502, Braniff's last scheduled flight, Jean Duncan's nearly four decades of flying had come to an end as well. Jean quickly went to work for the Arthur Anderson accounting firm in Dallas. She chose not to return to Braniff's successor, Braniff, Inc., when it began flying again in March 1984. Instead, she remained with Arthur Anderson until she retired in 1997.
On September 10, 2016, Jean Duncan was awarded the Braniff Airways Foundation Hall of Fame Award for her dedication to the aviation and airline industry and for her work in ensuring that the history and legacy of Braniff Airways would always be preserved. She remarked that the day she received the award was one of the best days of her life.
Jean remained active in the Clipped B's, the Association of Retired Braniff International Flight Attendants. In 2017, while walking her beloved dog Bella, near her home in North Dallas, she fell and broke her hip. Never to be undone, she quickly recovered from the surgery and excelled during her physical therapy. However, she decided to leave Dallas, her home since 1953, to move to an assisted living facility in Flower Mound, Texas, where she remained until her death.
On October 10, 2021, Braniff Airways Foundation created a Find A Grave page for Jean, which can be accessed by clicking this link:
https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/232915416/jean-duncan
Additional photos and biographical information will be added over the coming weeks. Please sign the guest book and leave a flower in her honor.
"The flash of that smile, the tilt of her head, you knew she was a professional the minute you met her. What you didn't realize was you would become part of her vast extended family and that she would love you as a best friend, worry about you more than your Mother ever would and if you graduated from one of her classes she would never, ever forget you."
From Jean Duncan's tribute for her induction into the Braniff Airways Foundation Hall of Fame in 2016.
Braniff International
Braniff Airways, Inc
Braniff Airways Foundation
+3
6,025
People Reached
1,138
Engagements
Boost Post
109109
6 Comments
25 Shares
Like
Comment
Share
A TRIBUTE TO JEAN DUNCAN
September 2016
It was 1952 and the phone rang in her apartment in Dallas Texas; someone from Braniff Airways wanted to know if she was interested in flying for the company? Her response was, "Well, I don't know, I will have to ask my Mom and Dad".
In that moment a Braniff Legend was born...! The flash of that smile, the tilt of her head, you knew she was a professional the minute you met her. What you didn't realize at the time was; you would become part of her vast extended family and that she would love you as a best friend, worry about you more than your Mother ever would… and if you had graduated from one of her classes she would never, ever forget you.
Jean Duncan, an only child, was born in Chapman Ranch Texas, a small town 17 miles south of Corpus Christi. Her Daddy was a farmer and a carpenter, her Mother was their homemaker. She attended school in Chapman Ranch through Junior High and graduated from CC High School. After graduation she finished two years of Junior College and then transferred to the University of Texas where she was graduated with a BA in 1948. For 3 years she taught Science, English and Math to the 7th-8th and 9th graders in Corpus.
After going through Hostess training, Jean was based in Dallas on January 1,1953 she flew on the line for six years, where she charmed every passenger, crew member or any other employee or individual that she happened to meet. In 1959 she was recruited to head up the Hostess training program; in 1967 she convinced the "Powers that Be" that Braniff truly needed a Training College and they agreed, the new building was built in1968. One of her more famous quotes the Flight Attendants remember from their training days was; "The only place a Hostess ever chews gum, is underneath the bed".
In 1969, her next assignment at Braniff was to open the new base in Houston, which she took on with as much love and efficiently as she did everything else. With the expansion of the airline routes growing so quickly, Jean got the feeling she was missing a lot of exciting times and made the decision to come back on the line and resume her flying career. She returned to the Dallas base and flew Domestic and International until that fateful day, May 12, 1982. She was the "Senior Mama" on the last flight back from Honolulu, Captained by Charlie Lamb, who famously told the dispatchers when they wanted him to return Fat Albert back to HNL, "negative, we are now at the point of no return". And so it was, that when flight 502 landed at DFW it was the end of Jean's flying career.
After the Braniff ceased operations, Jean worked for Arthur Anderson Accounting in Dallas and retired in 1997. She is now happily living in Dallas with her dog Bella and active in the Clipped Bee's.
For those of us who have had the pleasure of belonging to her extended family, we salute you Jean Duncan! We thank you for all you have done for us we can never repay you for what you have taught us, not only in the virtual classroom...but the classroom of life. God Bless you and Godspeed…
Clipped B's Association of Retired Braniff International Flight Attendants
From Jean Duncan's September 2016 induction into the Braniff Airways Foundation Hall of Fame
BRANIFF INTERNATIONAL
OBITUARY
While our hearts are saddened our hope is strong because for a time we had her in our lives....
Miss Jean Duncan
January 11, 1926 – October 10, 2021
Miss Jean Duncan, Braniff International's legendary flight attendant manager has died. She was in the care of Beehive Hospice at the time of her passing. Miss Duncan had become ill this past week and succumbed to her short illness at 1PM Dallas, Texas, time, at her hospice home in Lewisville, Texas. She was 95 years old.
A Queen, a legend, a mark in time, never again equaled.
"Never in my life have I had the opportunity to meet someone as poised and as smart as Jean Duncan. Her gracious smile only grew brighter in all my privileged years of knowing and working with her."
Harding L. Lawrence, Chairman, Braniff International, 1980
A native of Corpus Christi, Texas, she was born on the Chapman Ranch, Texas, on January 11, 1926. Chapman Ranch is an unincorporated town in southeast Nueces County, created from 34,000 acres of the fabled King Ranch that were purchased by the Chapman Family in 1919. The community is 7 miles south of Corpus Christi, where Jean and her family, which included her mother Mrs. Eloise McIlvaney and her father William Dwight Duncan moved to from Chapman Ranch.
Jean, an only child, attended public school at Chapman Ranch where she completed her elementary education. When she was 10, her family moved to Corpus Christi, where she first attended Wynn Seals Junior High School. She attended Corpus Christi High School where she graduated in the early 1940s. Jean began attending her first two years of college at the local Del Mar Junior College in Corpus Christi.
She attended University of Texas and received a Bachelor of Science degree in home economics with a minor in education. Always drawn to service, Miss Duncan began teaching seventh graders at Robert Driscoll High School in Corpus Christi beginning in January 1947 through June 1951. She then moved to Austin, Texas, accepting a secretarial position with the Director of the Texas University Health Center. Jean held this position for two years before she discovered the mystique of flight that would take her around the world during a career that spanned nearly four decades.
On June 1, 1953, Jean Duncan was hired by Braniff Airways, Inc. She was employed as a flight hostess, continuing her life of service. She flew as a flight attendant for the Dallas-based carrier for the next six years. She was based in Dallas and flew on every route that Braniff operated at the time.
Jean's excellence as a Braniff hostess was honored on July 10, 1956, when she was awarded the airline's special "Star Hostess" wing for outstanding service in flight. The wing featured a diamond and a star, which was designed by Mr. Guy Carter, Jr., manager of passenger service for Braniff Airways.
On January 20, 1957, Miss Duncan was crowned the Queen of Valley Air Transportation. The special crowning took place at the grand opening of the plush new El Padre Resort Hotel, which was located at the south end of Padre Island, Texas. Thousands of well-wishers were on hand for the grand opening and Jean's crowning ceremony.
Miss Duncan then decided that she would like to continue teaching but at Braniff instead of in the public schools. She accepted a position in the hostess management department in January 1959, becoming a hostess training instructor. In only one year, she was promoted to supervisor of training in September 1960, with one instructor under her management.
Braniff entered the jet age in 1959 and the airline began growing at a rate that required the hiring of two additional hostess instructors by 1962 and as a result, Jean Duncan was again promoted to the position of manager of hostess training. By 1964, Miss Duncan was responsible for training approximately 200 new flight hostesses every year. She conducted periodic refresher courses for the 425 hostesses and pursers assigned to Braniff's four flight crew bases based on the US Mainland and in South America.
On September 1, 1963, Jean Duncan was aboard Braniff's luxurious new Boeing 707-227 El Dorado Super Jet when it traveled to her hometown of Corpus Christi, for Salute to Aviation Day. She assisted with Braniff's special exhibit, which was set up in the main lobby of the new Corpus Christi International Airport. The exhibit featured a display of the hostess uniforms worn by the company's hostesses during the past 26 years.
The stylish exhibit featured Braniff's first uniform, which was a Bolero-style suit that the airline's first hostesses wore when they were hired in the spring of 1937 to ensure passenger comfort on the company's new 14-passenger Douglas DC-2 twin-engine airliners. In addition, to the uniform display, large display photos of Braniff aircraft from 1928 to present day were also part of the unique exhibit.
A few days later on September 9, 1963, Jean Duncan sat down with Mademoiselle Magazine's Travel Editor Miss Frances Koltun to discuss the Braniff flight hostess. Jean delivered some of her greatest quotes during the interview:
"In fact, we actually encourage our hostesses to regard the plane as their home away from home."
"While we certainly want them to be smart and efficient, we also want them to be warm and personable. In short, we expect our young ladies to personify our company's Friendly Transportation slogan."
"Most of Braniff's passengers are business people – women, as well as men – who know, practice and expect efficient, friendly treatment."
"We teach our hostesses to imagine a passenger is her parent or close friend and then ask herself if she would want that person treated the way she is treating this passenger."
"Although all 112 seats on one of our giant Boeing 707s jets may be occupied, a Braniff hostess is expected to make each passenger feel she is on board to serve especially him. The hostess must forget herself and think only of her passengers."
"Braniff wants wholesome, hometown girl – the "best personality" type, rather than "most beautiful" specifically, an interesting enthusiastic and warm personality, a friendly individual and then combine this with as much beauty and physical attractiveness as possible. Maturity and good judgement, along with proper background and environment are paramount."
During her previous eleven years with the company, Jean had the opportunity to travel extensively throughout the United States, South America and Europe. She represented Braniff on many special assignments that included an international travel seminar in Brussels, Belgium. By 1968, Jean had been responsible for training more than three-fourths of Braniff's 800-plus US-based hostesses on the roster to date.
With the advent of the revolutionary End of the Plain Plane Campaign, which Braniff introduced the world to in November 1965, the company began growing by more than $100 million dollars a year in business. Jean Duncan knew that Braniff would need a larger standalone hostess college. Since 1965, the airline's hostess college was housed on the fifth and sixth floors of Blanton Tower office building at the entrance to Love Field. The airline was quickly outgrowing the Blanton space.
In 1967, Braniff International announced that it would construct a $2 million USD Hostess College in the Oaklawn Neighborhood of Dallas, less than 2 miles from Love Field. The new facility would contain all hostess training functions under one roof.
On January 5, 1968, Braniff International dedicated the new Hostess College located at the corner of Wycliff Avenue and the Dallas North Tollway. All Braniff hostess training took place at this new facility and the opening of the facility was celebrated with three days of fanfare. Braniff Chairman Harding L. Lawrence, accompanied by Dallas Mayor Erik Jonsson and Dallas Chamber of Commerce President Morris Hite, dedicated the facility at noontime. Mr. Lawrence presented a gold key to the new building to the Manager of Hostess Training Miss Jean Duncan to symbolize the golden opportunities that the new facility would provide to its students.
On July 10, 1969, John R. Kersey, Vice President Customer Service announced that Jean Duncan would again be promoted, this time to Manager of the new Hostess Base in Houston, Texas, which opened on August 1, 1969. Jean remained in this position until 1972, when she decided that she wanted to return to line flying. She truly loved serving and conversing with her passengers from all over Braniff's far-flung route map.
For the next ten years, Jean flew the line and often worked Braniff's daily nonstop Boeing 747 flight from Dallas to Honolulu. She also enjoyed serving on the airline's new routes across the Atlantic to London, Paris, Frankfurt, Amsterdam and Brussels and across the Pacific to Guam and Hong Kong, Seoul and Singapore.
On May 12, 1982, Jean Duncan was the senior flight attendant on the company's nonstop Boeing 747 flight from DFW Airport to Honolulu. While the massive 747 was flying over Los Angeles, California, a message was relayed to the Captain that Braniff had ceased all flight operations and that he needed to land in Los Angeles. He shrewdly declined and continued to take his passengers and crew to their final destination in Hawaii.
The Big Orange 747 was refueled and the flight returned nonstop to DFW Airport, where for the first time Jean Duncan and her passengers could see a colorful rainbow of Braniff jets, not taxiing and taking off as normal, but all parked in solemn rows seemingly asking why they weren't flying today. Everyone on the 747 that early morning of May 13, 1982, was asking themselves that same question.
With the touchdown of Flight 502, Braniff's last scheduled flight, Jean Duncan's nearly four decades of flying had come to an end as well. Jean quickly went to work for the Arthur Anderson accounting firm in Dallas. She chose not to return to Braniff's successor, Braniff, Inc., when it began flying again in March 1984. Instead, she remained with Arthur Anderson until she retired in 1997.
On September 10, 2016, Jean Duncan was awarded the Braniff Airways Foundation Hall of Fame Award for her dedication to the aviation and airline industry and for her work in ensuring that the history and legacy of Braniff Airways would always be preserved. She remarked that the day she received the award was one of the best days of her life.
Jean remained active in the Clipped B's, the Association of Retired Braniff International Flight Attendants. In 2017, while walking her beloved dog Bella, near her home in North Dallas, she fell and broke her hip. Never to be undone, she quickly recovered from the surgery and excelled during her physical therapy. However, she decided to leave Dallas, her home since 1953, to move to an assisted living facility in Flower Mound, Texas, where she remained until her death.
On October 10, 2021, Braniff Airways Foundation created a Find A Grave page for Jean, which can be accessed by clicking this link:
https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/232915416/jean-duncan
Additional photos and biographical information will be added over the coming weeks. Please sign the guest book and leave a flower in her honor.
"The flash of that smile, the tilt of her head, you knew she was a professional the minute you met her. What you didn't realize was you would become part of her vast extended family and that she would love you as a best friend, worry about you more than your Mother ever would and if you graduated from one of her classes she would never, ever forget you."
From Jean Duncan's tribute for her induction into the Braniff Airways Foundation Hall of Fame in 2016.
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A TRIBUTE TO JEAN DUNCAN
September 2016
It was 1952 and the phone rang in her apartment in Dallas Texas; someone from Braniff Airways wanted to know if she was interested in flying for the company? Her response was, "Well, I don't know, I will have to ask my Mom and Dad".
In that moment a Braniff Legend was born...! The flash of that smile, the tilt of her head, you knew she was a professional the minute you met her. What you didn't realize at the time was; you would become part of her vast extended family and that she would love you as a best friend, worry about you more than your Mother ever would… and if you had graduated from one of her classes she would never, ever forget you.
Jean Duncan, an only child, was born in Chapman Ranch Texas, a small town 17 miles south of Corpus Christi. Her Daddy was a farmer and a carpenter, her Mother was their homemaker. She attended school in Chapman Ranch through Junior High and graduated from CC High School. After graduation she finished two years of Junior College and then transferred to the University of Texas where she was graduated with a BA in 1948. For 3 years she taught Science, English and Math to the 7th-8th and 9th graders in Corpus.
After going through Hostess training, Jean was based in Dallas on January 1,1953 she flew on the line for six years, where she charmed every passenger, crew member or any other employee or individual that she happened to meet. In 1959 she was recruited to head up the Hostess training program; in 1967 she convinced the "Powers that Be" that Braniff truly needed a Training College and they agreed, the new building was built in1968. One of her more famous quotes the Flight Attendants remember from their training days was; "The only place a Hostess ever chews gum, is underneath the bed".
In 1969, her next assignment at Braniff was to open the new base in Houston, which she took on with as much love and efficiently as she did everything else. With the expansion of the airline routes growing so quickly, Jean got the feeling she was missing a lot of exciting times and made the decision to come back on the line and resume her flying career. She returned to the Dallas base and flew Domestic and International until that fateful day, May 12, 1982. She was the "Senior Mama" on the last flight back from Honolulu, Captained by Charlie Lamb, who famously told the dispatchers when they wanted him to return Fat Albert back to HNL, "negative, we are now at the point of no return". And so it was, that when flight 502 landed at DFW it was the end of Jean's flying career.
After the Braniff ceased operations, Jean worked for Arthur Anderson Accounting in Dallas and retired in 1997. She is now happily living in Dallas with her dog Bella and active in the Clipped Bee's.
For those of us who have had the pleasure of belonging to her extended family, we salute you Jean Duncan! We thank you for all you have done for us we can never repay you for what you have taught us, not only in the virtual classroom...but the classroom of life. God Bless you and Godspeed…
Clipped B's Association of Retired Braniff International Flight Attendants
From Jean Duncan's September 2016 induction into the Braniff Airways Foundation Hall of Fame
OBITUARY
While our hearts are saddened our hope is strong because for a time we had her in our lives....
Miss Jean Duncan
January 11, 1926 – October 10, 2021
Miss Jean Duncan, Braniff International's legendary flight attendant manager has died. She was in the care of Beehive Hospice at the time of her passing. Miss Duncan had become ill this past week and succumbed to her short illness at 1PM Dallas, Texas, time, at her hospice home in Lewisville, Texas. She was 95 years old.
A Queen, a legend, a mark in time, never again equaled.
"Never in my life have I had the opportunity to meet someone as poised and as smart as Jean Duncan. Her gracious smile only grew brighter in all my privileged years of knowing and working with her."
Harding L. Lawrence, Chairman, Braniff International, 1980
A native of Corpus Christi, Texas, she was born on the Chapman Ranch, Texas, on January 11, 1926. Chapman Ranch is an unincorporated town in southeast Nueces County, created from 34,000 acres of the fabled King Ranch that were purchased by the Chapman Family in 1919. The community is 7 miles south of Corpus Christi, where Jean and her family, which included her mother Mrs. Eloise McIlvaney and her father William Dwight Duncan moved to from Chapman Ranch.
Jean, an only child, attended public school at Chapman Ranch where she completed her elementary education. When she was 10, her family moved to Corpus Christi, where she first attended Wynn Seals Junior High School. She attended Corpus Christi High School where she graduated in the early 1940s. Jean began attending her first two years of college at the local Del Mar Junior College in Corpus Christi.
She attended University of Texas and received a Bachelor of Science degree in home economics with a minor in education. Always drawn to service, Miss Duncan began teaching seventh graders at Robert Driscoll High School in Corpus Christi beginning in January 1947 through June 1951. She then moved to Austin, Texas, accepting a secretarial position with the Director of the Texas University Health Center. Jean held this position for two years before she discovered the mystique of flight that would take her around the world during a career that spanned nearly four decades.
On June 1, 1953, Jean Duncan was hired by Braniff Airways, Inc. She was employed as a flight hostess, continuing her life of service. She flew as a flight attendant for the Dallas-based carrier for the next six years. She was based in Dallas and flew on every route that Braniff operated at the time.
Jean's excellence as a Braniff hostess was honored on July 10, 1956, when she was awarded the airline's special "Star Hostess" wing for outstanding service in flight. The wing featured a diamond and a star, which was designed by Mr. Guy Carter, Jr., manager of passenger service for Braniff Airways.
On January 20, 1957, Miss Duncan was crowned the Queen of Valley Air Transportation. The special crowning took place at the grand opening of the plush new El Padre Resort Hotel, which was located at the south end of Padre Island, Texas. Thousands of well-wishers were on hand for the grand opening and Jean's crowning ceremony.
Miss Duncan then decided that she would like to continue teaching but at Braniff instead of in the public schools. She accepted a position in the hostess management department in January 1959, becoming a hostess training instructor. In only one year, she was promoted to supervisor of training in September 1960, with one instructor under her management.
Braniff entered the jet age in 1959 and the airline began growing at a rate that required the hiring of two additional hostess instructors by 1962 and as a result, Jean Duncan was again promoted to the position of manager of hostess training. By 1964, Miss Duncan was responsible for training approximately 200 new flight hostesses every year. She conducted periodic refresher courses for the 425 hostesses and pursers assigned to Braniff's four flight crew bases based on the US Mainland and in South America.
On September 1, 1963, Jean Duncan was aboard Braniff's luxurious new Boeing 707-227 El Dorado Super Jet when it traveled to her hometown of Corpus Christi, for Salute to Aviation Day. She assisted with Braniff's special exhibit, which was set up in the main lobby of the new Corpus Christi International Airport. The exhibit featured a display of the hostess uniforms worn by the company's hostesses during the past 26 years.
The stylish exhibit featured Braniff's first uniform, which was a Bolero-style suit that the airline's first hostesses wore when they were hired in the spring of 1937 to ensure passenger comfort on the company's new 14-passenger Douglas DC-2 twin-engine airliners. In addition, to the uniform display, large display photos of Braniff aircraft from 1928 to present day were also part of the unique exhibit.
A few days later on September 9, 1963, Jean Duncan sat down with Mademoiselle Magazine's Travel Editor Miss Frances Koltun to discuss the Braniff flight hostess. Jean delivered some of her greatest quotes during the interview:
"In fact, we actually encourage our hostesses to regard the plane as their home away from home."
"While we certainly want them to be smart and efficient, we also want them to be warm and personable. In short, we expect our young ladies to personify our company's Friendly Transportation slogan."
"Most of Braniff's passengers are business people – women, as well as men – who know, practice and expect efficient, friendly treatment."
"We teach our hostesses to imagine a passenger is her parent or close friend and then ask herself if she would want that person treated the way she is treating this passenger."
"Although all 112 seats on one of our giant Boeing 707s jets may be occupied, a Braniff hostess is expected to make each passenger feel she is on board to serve especially him. The hostess must forget herself and think only of her passengers."
"Braniff wants wholesome, hometown girl – the "best personality" type, rather than "most beautiful" specifically, an interesting enthusiastic and warm personality, a friendly individual and then combine this with as much beauty and physical attractiveness as possible. Maturity and good judgement, along with proper background and environment are paramount."
During her previous eleven years with the company, Jean had the opportunity to travel extensively throughout the United States, South America and Europe. She represented Braniff on many special assignments that included an international travel seminar in Brussels, Belgium. By 1968, Jean had been responsible for training more than three-fourths of Braniff's 800-plus US-based hostesses on the roster to date.
With the advent of the revolutionary End of the Plain Plane Campaign, which Braniff introduced the world to in November 1965, the company began growing by more than $100 million dollars a year in business. Jean Duncan knew that Braniff would need a larger standalone hostess college. Since 1965, the airline's hostess college was housed on the fifth and sixth floors of Blanton Tower office building at the entrance to Love Field. The airline was quickly outgrowing the Blanton space.
In 1967, Braniff International announced that it would construct a $2 million USD Hostess College in the Oaklawn Neighborhood of Dallas, less than 2 miles from Love Field. The new facility would contain all hostess training functions under one roof.
On January 5, 1968, Braniff International dedicated the new Hostess College located at the corner of Wycliff Avenue and the Dallas North Tollway. All Braniff hostess training took place at this new facility and the opening of the facility was celebrated with three days of fanfare. Braniff Chairman Harding L. Lawrence, accompanied by Dallas Mayor Erik Jonsson and Dallas Chamber of Commerce President Morris Hite, dedicated the facility at noontime. Mr. Lawrence presented a gold key to the new building to the Manager of Hostess Training Miss Jean Duncan to symbolize the golden opportunities that the new facility would provide to its students.
On July 10, 1969, John R. Kersey, Vice President Customer Service announced that Jean Duncan would again be promoted, this time to Manager of the new Hostess Base in Houston, Texas, which opened on August 1, 1969. Jean remained in this position until 1972, when she decided that she wanted to return to line flying. She truly loved serving and conversing with her passengers from all over Braniff's far-flung route map.
For the next ten years, Jean flew the line and often worked Braniff's daily nonstop Boeing 747 flight from Dallas to Honolulu. She also enjoyed serving on the airline's new routes across the Atlantic to London, Paris, Frankfurt, Amsterdam and Brussels and across the Pacific to Guam and Hong Kong, Seoul and Singapore.
On May 12, 1982, Jean Duncan was the senior flight attendant on the company's nonstop Boeing 747 flight from DFW Airport to Honolulu. While the massive 747 was flying over Los Angeles, California, a message was relayed to the Captain that Braniff had ceased all flight operations and that he needed to land in Los Angeles. He shrewdly declined and continued to take his passengers and crew to their final destination in Hawaii.
The Big Orange 747 was refueled and the flight returned nonstop to DFW Airport, where for the first time Jean Duncan and her passengers could see a colorful rainbow of Braniff jets, not taxiing and taking off as normal, but all parked in solemn rows seemingly asking why they weren't flying today. Everyone on the 747 that early morning of May 13, 1982, was asking themselves that same question.
With the touchdown of Flight 502, Braniff's last scheduled flight, Jean Duncan's nearly four decades of flying had come to an end as well. Jean quickly went to work for the Arthur Anderson accounting firm in Dallas. She chose not to return to Braniff's successor, Braniff, Inc., when it began flying again in March 1984. Instead, she remained with Arthur Anderson until she retired in 1997.
On September 10, 2016, Jean Duncan was awarded the Braniff Airways Foundation Hall of Fame Award for her dedication to the aviation and airline industry and for her work in ensuring that the history and legacy of Braniff Airways would always be preserved. She remarked that the day she received the award was one of the best days of her life.
Jean remained active in the Clipped B's, the Association of Retired Braniff International Flight Attendants. In 2017, while walking her beloved dog Bella, near her home in North Dallas, she fell and broke her hip. Never to be undone, she quickly recovered from the surgery and excelled during her physical therapy. However, she decided to leave Dallas, her home since 1953, to move to an assisted living facility in Flower Mound, Texas, where she remained until her death.
On October 10, 2021, Braniff Airways Foundation created a Find A Grave page for Jean, which can be accessed by clicking this link:
https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/232915416/jean-duncan
Additional photos and biographical information will be added over the coming weeks. Please sign the guest book and leave a flower in her honor.
"The flash of that smile, the tilt of her head, you knew she was a professional the minute you met her. What you didn't realize was you would become part of her vast extended family and that she would love you as a best friend, worry about you more than your Mother ever would and if you graduated from one of her classes she would never, ever forget you."
From Jean Duncan's tribute for her induction into the Braniff Airways Foundation Hall of Fame in 2016.
Braniff International
Braniff Airways, Inc
Braniff Airways Foundation
+3
6,025
People Reached
1,138
Engagements
Boost Post
109109
6 Comments
25 Shares
Like
Comment
Share
A TRIBUTE TO JEAN DUNCAN
September 2016
It was 1952 and the phone rang in her apartment in Dallas Texas; someone from Braniff Airways wanted to know if she was interested in flying for the company? Her response was, "Well, I don't know, I will have to ask my Mom and Dad".
In that moment a Braniff Legend was born...! The flash of that smile, the tilt of her head, you knew she was a professional the minute you met her. What you didn't realize at the time was; you would become part of her vast extended family and that she would love you as a best friend, worry about you more than your Mother ever would… and if you had graduated from one of her classes she would never, ever forget you.
Jean Duncan, an only child, was born in Chapman Ranch Texas, a small town 17 miles south of Corpus Christi. Her Daddy was a farmer and a carpenter, her Mother was their homemaker. She attended school in Chapman Ranch through Junior High and graduated from CC High School. After graduation she finished two years of Junior College and then transferred to the University of Texas where she was graduated with a BA in 1948. For 3 years she taught Science, English and Math to the 7th-8th and 9th graders in Corpus.
After going through Hostess training, Jean was based in Dallas on January 1,1953 she flew on the line for six years, where she charmed every passenger, crew member or any other employee or individual that she happened to meet. In 1959 she was recruited to head up the Hostess training program; in 1967 she convinced the "Powers that Be" that Braniff truly needed a Training College and they agreed, the new building was built in1968. One of her more famous quotes the Flight Attendants remember from their training days was; "The only place a Hostess ever chews gum, is underneath the bed".
In 1969, her next assignment at Braniff was to open the new base in Houston, which she took on with as much love and efficiently as she did everything else. With the expansion of the airline routes growing so quickly, Jean got the feeling she was missing a lot of exciting times and made the decision to come back on the line and resume her flying career. She returned to the Dallas base and flew Domestic and International until that fateful day, May 12, 1982. She was the "Senior Mama" on the last flight back from Honolulu, Captained by Charlie Lamb, who famously told the dispatchers when they wanted him to return Fat Albert back to HNL, "negative, we are now at the point of no return". And so it was, that when flight 502 landed at DFW it was the end of Jean's flying career.
After the Braniff ceased operations, Jean worked for Arthur Anderson Accounting in Dallas and retired in 1997. She is now happily living in Dallas with her dog Bella and active in the Clipped Bee's.
For those of us who have had the pleasure of belonging to her extended family, we salute you Jean Duncan! We thank you for all you have done for us we can never repay you for what you have taught us, not only in the virtual classroom...but the classroom of life. God Bless you and Godspeed…
Clipped B's Association of Retired Braniff International Flight Attendants
From Jean Duncan's September 2016 induction into the Braniff Airways Foundation Hall of Fame
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