Originally Posted by jabberwok
An interesting era because HC were one of many shipping companies to invest in aviation post war and I guess there may be older people than I who could tell some stories about them. I recall Cunard Eagle but there must have been more......
The best example was probably British and Commonwealth Shipping whose airline business goes back to people like British Island Airways, which after mergers became Air UK. They were the major owner of Air UK, I think, until KLM started gradually taking control.
At a tangent, this also reminds me of the pre-WW2 Railway Air Services, which was an attempt by the railways (they were more or less still privately owned at that stage) to spread their risk by moving into airline ownership. Even I am not old enough to remember them directly, however.