Slick Airways was a pioneering United States freight airline founded after World War II by Earl F. Slick, a 26-year-old oil heir and former military pilot. Its substantial capitalization and size set it apart from many hundreds of similar airlines founded in the same era. In the immediate post World War II era, Slick carried more domestic air freight than any other airline, even its contemporary, the famous Flying Tiger Line (FTL). Slick Airways was initially an irregular air carrier (without formal government certification) before becoming one of the first scheduled US cargo airlines, certificated as a domestic "all-cargo carrier" in 1949 by the Civil Aeronautics Board (CAB), the now-defunct Federal agency that, at the time, tightly controlled most US commercial air transport. FTL received its certificate in the same proceeding.
However, domestic scheduled air cargo was unprofitable for pure cargo airlines during this period. Such carriers survived by making up the deficit in other businesses, but Slick was relatively undiversified and ultimately unable to endure. In 1953–1954, Slick suffered a disruptive failed merger with FTL. Slick obtained CAB permission to suspend scheduled service in 1958 after which it mostly flew for the military. After resuming scheduled service in 1962, Slick ceased again in 1965. In 1966 Slick merged its remaining military charter business with fellow scheduled cargo operator Airlift International. In 1968 Slick's dormant domestic scheduled authority also transferred to Airlift. The Slick Corporation survived for a time as a company active outside the airline industry.
History
Startup through certification Slick Airways incorporated in Delaware on 4 January 1946 and started operations 4 March. 26-year-old Earl Slick was an Air Transport Command pilot in World War II, the son of Thomas Baker Slick Sr., who made a fortune in oil, and the brother of Tom Slick, a philanthropist and adventurer, who also invested in the airline. After World War II, hundreds of small airlines emerged as former military aviators sought to make a living using surplus military aircraft. Slick Airways stood out for its size, initially capitalized at $1.12 million (over $18 million in 2025 terms), which it noted in a national advertising campaign. The aircraft were cheap; of an initial fleet of 10 Curtiss C-46s, nine were purchased from the government for a total of $247,000; each originally cost the US military about $200,000. Further, in 1946, Slick's C-46s were 10 of only 15 wartime production certificated for civilian use; there were over 600 more surplus C-46s but none could be used for civilian air transport until conversion programs were designed. Slick's C-46s had been destined for the Republic of China Air Force (ROCAF) and Slick adopted ROCAF's six blue tail stripes. The slogan "Ship the Slick Way—By Air!" was written aft of the cargo door. By 1951 Slick would write off six of its original ten C-46s in crashes, four fatal. (see Accidents).
Earl Slick was inspired by his experiences during World War II. Air freight was a tiny business prior to the war, when the US military proved its worth. The airline experimented with techniques to expand the utility of air freight. It cooled its aircraft in warm weather and kept the fuselage warm at altitude to protect delicate cargos. From 1946 thru 1952 (with the exception of 1949, when it was second to American Airlines), Slick transported more domestic airfreight than any other US carrier. In the mid 1950s, Slick experimented with light-weight containers for household goods, the idea being that customers would avoid expenses while waiting for belongings to arrive by truck.
The early air freight business was unprofitable: Slick lost $861K in 1946 and another $444K in 1947. FTL had losses of similar scale. In late 1947, the trunk carriers (e.g. American Airlines, United) started a freight price war that, in the view of Aviation Week, put the freight carriers' "backs against the wall". The trunks could cover freight losses with passenger revenue and were well paid to fly the US mail. Slick offered to fly mail for less than half what the trunks received, which the CAB dismissed as "an unanalyzed gesture ... intended to confuse the proceeding," and insisted no government money subsidized trunk competition with freight airlines. A 1951 CAB publication conceded mail pay did include subsidies. California Eastern Airways, another leading freight airline, was bankrupt by May 1948. Air freight was viewed as having great potential. The CAB, in assessing the possible economic impact of air freight, noted 1 billion potential ton miles of air freight (versus 118 million in 1948) translated to $150–200 million in revenue versus 1948 total airline passenger revenues of $346 million. Slick was by far the largest domestic air freight carrier, over twice the size of FTL in 1948 by ton-miles. In July 1949, Slick was one of four airlines certificated as a scheduled "all-cargo carrier" by the CAB, getting a southern transcontinental route (FTL got a northern route, U. S. Airlines got a north/south route and Airnews got a local Texas network). None were permitted to carry the US mail.
+ Table 1: Slick Airways financial results, 1950–1958 USD 000 1950 1951 1952 1953 1954 1955 195619571958Op revenue: Scheduled 5,329 6,590 6,764 6,293 5,629 6,841 8,014 7,914 305 Non-sched 1,245 2,668 503 1,280 299 2,565 9,313 10,591 5,848 Other 183 543 1,096 1,544 30 608 368 Total6,757 9,802 8,363 9,117 5,958 9,446 17,718 19,115 6,523Operating result 541 456 147 (234) (1,287) (909) 379 (2,853) (496)Net result507 353 434 1,239 (1,030) (553) 327 (2,246) (769) Op margin (%)8.0 4.7 1.8 -2.6 -21.6 -9.6 2.1 -14.9 -7.6 Mkt share (%)(1) 10.0 11.1 9.8 8.5 7.1 7.3 7.4 6.1 (1) Of total US scheduled air freight, international and domestic
Quicktrans
In July 1950 the US Navy, facing the Korean War, had 48 tons of ammunition on the east coast that it needed on the west. The Navy contracted Slick to fly the materiel in what was called "Operation Quicktrans." This worked well, so the Navy extended the arrangement and Slick flew daily transcontinental flights linking Navy bases on two coasts. Transit times dropped to a day or two from what had previously been a week or more and resulting costs were better than Railway Express or trucks due to high aircraft utilization and full aircraft. This was the genesis of a US Navy domestic air freight system called Quicktrans that would be the backbone of the Navy's domestic transport network through 1994.
DC-6A and Flying Tiger attempted merger In October 1950, Slick was the civil launch customer for the DC-6A, a more capable cargo version of the DC-6. The airline also moved its headquarters to Lockheed Air Terminal in Burbank, California from San Antonio, Texas, in 1951. Slick's headquarters moved several more times, to Dallas in 1956, back to Burbank by 1958, lastly to San Francisco in 1962.
In March 1953, FTL agreed to buy out Slick. FTL had become more successful than Slick, in part because more of its revenue was outside of scheduled air freight, with a large military contract flying over the Pacific and maintenance and aircraft trading/leasing businesses. In 1952, 26% of FTL's revenue was schedued air freight versus 47% for Slick. In the same year, FTL had beaten Slick for the Navy's Quicktrans contract at rates Slick viewed as unprofitable. Slick made a profit in 1952 only by selling aircraft. The CAB approved the merger in January 1954. FTL and Slick started to integrate but by September the deal collapsed due to CAB-mandated labor protective provisions that paid employees disadvantaged by the merger. Estimated payments ranged up to over $6 million, costs avoidable by not completing the merger. For a few weeks, FTL said it would leave the freight business entirely, in favor of aircraft leasing, but its employees rallied and provided it with pay cuts. Slick had to reconstitute its own headquarters, find new facilities at airports from which it had already withdrawn, and faced a rejuvenated and more efficient FTL. Further, it had shrunk its fleet (see Fleet) in anticipation of the merger. In the wake of the failed merger, Earl Slick stepped down as chair of the board and his executive role. 1958 scheduled service suspension and military contracting On 24 February 1958, Slick ceased scheduled service: the airline lost over $3 million in scheduled service in the year-ending June 1957. Slick tried to make that up with military charters. But, at that time, the Air Force provided most routine transportation with its own transportation service, Military Air Transport Service (MATS). The little left over for airlines was allocated by bid, and those bids were becoming increasingly keen. Military charters no longer covered Slick's scheduled system losses. Slick also blamed the CAB for not sufficiently supporting the scheduled freight business. The CAB approved Slick's suspension in June, in a decision which disagreed it was culpable for Slick's troubles. Slick became almost a pure military contractor. In US government fiscal years (then ending June) 1959, 1960, 1961, Slick received 94%, 95% and 96% respectively of its revenue from the US military (which Table 2 shows was profitable). By contrast, the same numbers for FTL for the same years were 46%, 31% and 48%. In December 1961, Slick was flying Lockheed L-1049 Super Constellations to Asia for the Air Force from Travis Air Force Base and DC-6As and DC-4s for Quicktrans again.
In 1960, the Air Force changed how it bought military charters. It de-emphasized MATS's own aircraft for routine transport, instead relying on commercial carriers like Slick. Further, it would no longer rely on competitive bidding, instead, it established uniform (and higher) charter rates. With price no longer a factor, charter contracts were allocated to airlines that enrolled what the government viewed as desirable aircraft in the Civil Reserve Air Fleet. Military charters became a more reliable and lucrative source of revenue for Slick.
+ Table 2: Slick Airways(1) financial results, 1959–1966 USD 000 1959 1960 1961 1962 1963 1964 19651966Op revenue: Scheduled 646 3,749 4,711 2,662 Non-sched 9,221 11,799 11,775 21,050 15,810 18,827 18,426 9,916 Other 445 201 216 72 93 119 326 218 Total9,667 12,000 11,991 21,769 19,652 23,655 21,415 10,134 Operating result 1,008 1,114 1,259 2,124 39 73 713 2,671 Net result159 1,252 1,183 1,262 (635) (487) 203 1,198 Op margin (%)10.4 9.3 10.5 9.8 0.2 0.3 3.3 26.4 (1) after 31 August 1962, the airline division of Slick Corporation
Unprofitable sector Domestic scheduled cargo was unprofitable for pure freight operators at the time. It was well known; academics wrote papers about it. Every such operator struggled. As previously noted, in 1949, the CAB certificated Slick, FTL, U. S. Airlines and Airnews for domestic scheduled cargo. In 1955 the CAB additionally certificated Riddle (later known as Airlift International) and AAXICO for domestic scheduled cargo. Airnews, U. S. Airlines and AAXICO flew only small amounts of scheduled cargo before exiting. Airnews returned its certificate in 1951. U. S. Airlines went bankrupt in 1951 and was out of business entirely by 1954. AAXICO withdrew scheduled domestic cargo business in 1959 after two-and-half years.