10

I found this image on LinkedIn post.

interior of the aircraft

This was economy class back in the 1960s. [...]

I'm not sure whether it's fake or not.

Was there a company that offered this aircraft interior in the 60s? If this was an industrial design mockup how close did that get to reality?

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  • Reverse searching that image on Google returned a search result of "flying in the 1970s" – Andrew T. Jun 27 '17 at 2:12
  • The amount of legspace <- Must be a fake – M. Mimpen Jun 27 '17 at 8:08
  • @M.Mimpen this is not completely clear, see the comment form the user sempaiscuba to the answer below – J. Doe Jun 27 '17 at 8:33
17

It seems that it's a mock-up image produced as publicity for the passenger model of the 747 aircraft by Boeing/Pan-American Airways.

It would have to have been from the late 1960s, since the 747 entered service with Pan Am in January 1970.

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  • but were they actually anticipating to build an aircraft with exactly that interior for the economy class? – J. Doe Jun 27 '17 at 8:09
  • 1
    @J.Doe The picture shows a mock-up, so at that point they probably didn't know exactly how the final version of the interior would look, but they probably did anticipate it would be similar to the mock-up. We should remember that even economy class was expensive in 1970 The passenger version of the original Boeing 747 (the 747-100) had a maximum capacity of 480 passengers. The first batch of 10 aircraft that entered service with Pan-Am were configured to seat just 366, so people would certainly have had far more legroom/headroom than they get now! – sempaiscuba♦ Jun 27 '17 at 8:30
  • @J.Doe and the seating arrangement isn't that dissimilar to what was in use in 747-200s in the 1990s. This one shows a 3-4-3 arrangement, by then KLM had gone to a 3-5-3 and most of that came from slightly narrower aisles rather than making the seats more narrow (notice how the cart in this image has a lot of room to spare, in the '90s they had barely any room to spare). Leg room decreased, in no small part because the law now allows for less leg room. – jwenting Jun 27 '17 at 8:48
  • I think it's only the passengers in the front seats that have a lot of leg room. I doubt the other passengers has as much leg room. About the cart, it is hidden behind an exceptionally dark chair. I don't think the cart has that much room to spare as it may look like. Apart from that, the photo is probably shoot with a wide angle lens. That means the space may appear larger. – Ulf Tennfors Jun 27 '17 at 8:59

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