Huntsville International Airport Southern served Atlanta, Chattanooga, Memphis, Montgomery, Muscle Shoals, Nashville, New Orleans and Orlando nonstop from Huntsville using DC-9 aircraft. Southern had direct DC-9s from Huntsville to New York City (LaGuardia Airport), Washington, D,C. (Dulles Airport), Denver, St. Louis, Detroit and Wichita. In 1979 Southern merged with North Central Airlines to form Republic Airlines which continued to serve Huntsville, by that time having dropped Chattanooga and Montgomery service and having added Greenville/Spartanburg and Mobile/Pascagoula service. Republic was acquired by Northwest Airlines which later merged with Delta Air Lines. Service to Atlanta (ATL) hit a high point in early 1985 when 17
Washington Dulles International Airport Prince George's County, Maryland into an airport. The current site was selected by President Eisenhower in 1958; the Dulles name was chosen by Eisenhower's aviation advisor Pete Quesada, who later served as the first head of the Federal Aviation Administration. As a result of the site selection, the unincorporated, largely African-American community of Willard, which once stood in the airport's current footprint, was demolished, and 87 property owners had their holdings condemned. Dulles was also built over a lesser known airport named Blue Ridge Airport, chartered in 1938 by the U.S.. The airport was Loudoun County's first official airport consisting