Pan American World Airways First Flight New York Airport - Douala Cameroon 1965

Description

Pan American incorporated three new West African cities into Foreign Air Mail Route 18 more than a year after receiving
authority. The service was performed in conjunction with Air Afrique, a consortium of some 11 French speaking
nations with whom Pan American had made a blocked-space agreement under which the latter
would furnish equipment and personnel for the new route with Air Afrique leasing 25 percent of all
space on each flight. Because of continued unsettled conditions in the Congo area, the new flight from
New York to Ivory Coast, Dahomey and Cameroun – which had stopped at Dakar and Monrovia – was
not extended to Brazzaville in the Republic of Congo, the certified terminus point.
This cover was carried on the May 16, 1965 inaugural Foreign Air Mail Route 18 flight from the John F Kennedy Airport Mail Facility in New York, New York to Douala, Cameroon
(where it was backstamped
) and is listed in the Foreign Air Mail (FAM) Section of The American Air Mail Catalogue as F18-375F.