With 2026, United Airlines is proudly kicking off its centenary year. Very few carriers can look back on 100 years of operation – and when your airline company happens to have the world’s biggest fleet and largest workforce, then the contrast to how it all began, cannot be greater. Particularly since those beginnings were in cargo rather than passenger; more specifically, in airmail, and markedly so.
It all began with airmail. Walter Varney, the founder of United Airlines’ precursor, Varney Air Lines, had the original intention simply of offering a service to move mail by air, reliably and on time. This was in response to the 1925 Contract Air Mail (Kelly) Act, which sought to establish a transport network together with private firms, to shoulder a growing demand for airmail that, since 1918, had first been flown by U.S. army pilots and then by a dedicated Post Office Aerial Mail Service.
It all began on 6 April 1926
The first Varney Air Lines flight, as part of the CAM-5 airmail service, set off on 06APR26, from Pasco (WA) via Boise (ID) to Elko (NV) – a route that sowed the seed for what would become today’s United Airlines. CAM-5 stood for Contract Air Mail Route No. 5, and was the fifth route awarded by the U.S. Post Office under the Kelly Act – a route that Varney Air Lines apparently won because it was the sole bidder for it at the time. It did not take long for the airline to expand its network to Salt Lake City, Portland and Seattle, nor for it to gradually evolve into a passenger carrying airline – originally with aircraft such as the Boeing 80, designed to carry up to 12 passengers as well as mail, where passenger revenue was seen as a supplement to mail income. Today, the opposite holds true: profitable cargo forms the baseload for passenger routes in most cases – not just for United Airlines.
Passengers and post
“People think of United as a passenger airline,” says Kelly Feeney, Manager of Domestic and AMOT Postal Sales and Operations. “But there’s a whole world moving underneath those flights that most people never see.” For United Airlines, today, that world now consists of all kinds of cargo. Mail still plays a major role, and Varney’s original vision continues to steer its management, as Stephanie Giraldi, Senior Manager of Postal Network Optimization & Performance at United Cargo, confirms: “We take mail very seriously at United. This isn’t something we treat as an afterthought. It’s about performance. It’s about doing it right, every time. One of United’s earliest flights carried U.S. mail. That partnership with the Postal Service isn’t just part of our history. It’s the foundation of it.”
Bigger and even better
The scale of mail operations today, and how they are handled, are a far cry from what they were when Varney and his pilots started out, one hundred years ago. The initial CAM-5 flight has developed into an intricate and extensive network of domestic, and international routes, contractually supporting the United States Postal Services and over 20 postal authorities across the world. A business that, in the past 5 years alone, brought in over USD 970 million in postal revenue from the transport of over 340 million kilograms of mail. And processes have evolved to support its growth. In 1926, mailbags were strapped into open cockpits of planes that were largely flown on pilot instinct and experience. Today, pilots and mail processes are hugely supported by digitalization and enhanced technology – from asphalted and illuminated landing strips, through to intelligent cockpit systems, to each mail item being carefully labeled, scanned, tracked, and delivered as expected – and far more quickly than ever before.
Mail matters
While so much these days is now communicated by email, nothing beats the joy of receiving a physical letter or parcel from home. Much of what United Airlines transports when it comes to mail is destined for military service members, often stationed thousands of miles from home. Kate Hurley, International Postal Operations and Sales Manager, explains the emotional importance of running an airmail service: “Mail is often the strongest physical connection to home for military members overseas,” she said. “Care packages. Letters. Familiar things. That matters.”
In 1926, airmail flew in small aircraft across short routes. Today, those mailbags are loaded into modern, high-tech, widebody planes that traverse time zones and continents at speeds unheard of 100 years ago. While the scale has changed, Hurley underlines that: “The purpose is still the same. You’re moving something people are waiting for.”
