I have never flown TWA or Trans-World Airlines. However, my wife's father worked for several years in the 1960~70's for this once great airline. He was a system analysis, working on setting up their reservation system at the time. No small feat then since the average huge room mainframe computer had less computing power then the Smartphone you maybe using to find this cache :).
TWA was started in 1925 as Western Air Express. TWA was formed in 1930 after a merger between Western Air Express and Transcontinental Air Transport to form Transcontinental & Western Air or T&WA.
In 1950 T&WA changed its name to TransWorld Airlines. TWA built an iconic terminal, the Trans World Flight Center, at NY's JFK Airport design by Ero Saarinen . It is currently Terminal 5 which JetBlue remodeled and continues to this day.
TWA went thru a series of bankruptcies after deregulation. But probably the nail in the coffin for TWA happened on July 17, 1996. TWA Flight 800, a Boeing 747, blew up over the Atlantic Ocean near Long Island, NY killing all 230 souls on board. The NTSB determined cause was a spark from exposed wiring in the center fuel tank.
The end for TWA came in 2001 when American Airlines acquired TWA. The last TWA flight was on Dec. 1, 2001. Prior to its closure TWA maintained hubs at JFK, St. Louis, Atlanta, Denver, Puerto Rico, with focus cities of Kansas City, LAX and Paris.
So here is a salute to one of the old airline greats, which most have disappearing along with TWA (like Easterm and Pam-Am).