Eastern Air Lines

Eastern Air Lines was one of the Big Four domestic carriers, the airline of the Eastern Seaboard. Eddie Rickenbacker, the World War I flying ace, ran it for decades. At its peak, Eastern was the largest airline in the free world by passengers carried.

Frank Borman, the Apollo 8 astronaut, became CEO in 1975 and spent a decade in brutal labor negotiations. When Frank Lorenzo took over in 1986 through a hostile acquisition by Texas Air, the relationship between management and unions went nuclear. Lorenzo had already broken unions at Continental Airlines and workers feared the same playbook.

The machinists struck in March 1989. The pilots and flight attendants honored the picket lines. Lorenzo kept the airline running with replacement workers, but the brand was destroyed. Passengers wouldn't fly an airline at war with itself. Eastern filed for bankruptcy and limped along for two years while Lorenzo stripped its assets (selling the shuttle to Donald Trump, the Latin American routes to American). The last flight took off on January 18, 1991.