San Juan Airlines

Ghost Corp Apparel — resurrecting iconic corporate ghosts.

This is the legacy San Juan Airlines, Inc. of Washington: a regional commuter carrier whose roots reach to Bob and Mary Schoen’s Orcas Island Air Service, begun in July 1947. The operation became Island Sky Ferries in 1948, and pilot Roy Franklin developed it into a year-round aerial lifeline for the San Juan Islands—when a cow pasture could still qualify as infrastructure.

Island Sky Ferries became San Juan Airlines in 1971. The carrier connected island communities with mainland points including Bellingham, Seattle/Tacoma, Port Angeles, and Hoquiam, and later served Vancouver and Victoria. Its historically documented corporate headquarters was at Fairchild International Airport in Port Angeles, Washington.

San Juan Airlines acquired Port Angeles-based Pearson Aircraft in 1981, adding Pearson’s services between Port Angeles and Seattle/Olympia. From August 15, 1987, it flew under the United Express banner. Competition in the increasingly consolidated commuter-airline business proved brutal; operations ended in early 1989. That March, federal proceedings addressed transfer of several San Juan international route authorities to Horizon Air. The name would later return in a separate revived operation, but this collection concerns the 1947-1989 commuter original.

Our San Juan Airlines collection celebrates the scrappy island connector that made schedules, freight, and improbable little runways feel like civilization. Put on the ghost of a Northwest airline that knew every cloud had a shortcut—and probably a crosswind.