01/04/2019
Today Arrowhead Films joins Southwest Airlines in mourning its founder Herb Kelleher, a great Texan and a great businessman. His impact on commercial aviation is legendary, but one thing many might not know about Herb is that he was the first airline owner to hire Vietnam War veteran aviators. Where others saw war-damaged goods, Herb saw highly trained and successful pilots like Mike Venable and others who could help him build the safest, fastest, and at the time, cheapest "your company plane" airline. Because of this, he was a proud supporter of our documentary "In the Shadow of the Blade," and we were proud and delighted to give him a flight on 091 to a fantastic hangar veterans celebration he hosted at LZ Southwest. Today that helicopter is in the Smithsonian Museum of American History, and this very good man has surely made Heaven a lot more fun than it was before his arrival.
Herb Kelleher was a pioneer in many ways, but especially when it came to hiring Vietnam Veterans when many other businesses turned them away.