Coffee, Tea or Me?

Table of Contents

 

Trudy Baker and Rachel Jones met, and became fast friends, while stewardesses for the now defunct Eastern Airlines. Although different in style and appearance—Rachel tall, blonde, and breezy; Trudy shorter, brunette, and more demure—they shared an appreciation of the humorous experiences and people they encountered on their flights. One day, a passenger with publishing connections, who’d found their stories funny, introduced them to a top New York editor, launching the saga of
Coffee, Tea or Me?
Trudy and Rachel appeared on myriad radio and TV shows across the country, their winsome personalities endearing them to millions of listeners and viewers.

Donald Bain is the ghostwriter or author of more than eighty books, including
Coffee, Tea or Me?,
and the best-selling
Murder, She Wrote
series of original murder mystery novels based upon the popular TV show. His writing career spans biographies, comedies, crime novels, historical romances, investigative journalism, and business books. He was recently designated 2003 Distinguished Alumni by his alma mater, Purdue University. (A more detailed look at his career can be found at
donaldbain.com
.)

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First published in the United States of America by Bartholomew House Ltd. 1967
Published by Bantam Book, a subsidiary of Grosset & Dunlap, Inc. 1968
Published with a new introduction in Penguin Books 2003

 

Copyright © Bartholomew House, Ltd., 1967

Introduction copyright © Donald Bain, 2003
All rights reserved

 

LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOGING-IN-PUBLICATION DATA

 

 

Baker, Trudy.
Coffee, tea or me? : the uninhibited memoirs of two airline stewardesses /
Trudy Baker and Rachel Jones ; illustrated by Bill Wenzel.
p. cm.

Originally published: New York : Bartholomew House, 1967.

eISBN : 978-1-101-09894-3

1. Flight attendants—Biography. 2. Air travel. I. Jones, Rachel. II. Title.
HD6073.A43B34 2003
387.7’42’0922—dc21 2003044462

 

 

 

 

The scanning, uploading and distribution of this book via the Internet or via any other means without the permission of the publisher is illegal and punishable by law. Please purchase only authorized electronic editions, and do not participate in or encourage electronic piracy of copyrighted materials. Your support of the author’s rights is appreciated.

So many thanks to Don Bain, writer and friend, who’s flown enough to know how funny it really can be. Without him,
Coffee, Tea or Me?
would still be nothing more than the punch line of an old airline joke.

So this stewardess enters the cockpit and asks the captain, “Coffee, tea or me?”

He displays his best leer and answers, “Whichever is easier to make.”

Little did I know in 1967 that the book I was writing with a title lifted from a lame old joke would go on, along with its three sequels, to sell more than five million copies, be translated into a dozen languages, cause anxious mothers to forbid their daughters from becoming stewardesses, spawn airline protest groups, have its title inducted into the public vocabulary, and be republished thirty-six years later, branding me the world’s oldest, tallest, bearded airline stewardess.

I’ve loved every minute of it.

Anyone reading
Coffee, Tea or Me?
today, who’s flown recently on a commercial airline, will wonder whether air travel could ever have been as much fun—even glamorous—as depicted by Rachel and Trudy. I assure you it was. And like most people who traveled by air during the sixties and seventies, I miss those carefree, alluring days. Taking a flight was something special. You dressed up before boarding a plane and never had to worry about being stuck next to a seat companion wearing rubber thongs on bare feet, a sleeveless undershirt, and a baseball cap on backward. Back then, everyone was a jet-setter. Sinatra’s “Come Fly with Me” was written for and sung especially to you. Smokers had their own section on the planes, and a cold, dry martini was de rigueur while cruising the skies. Although it became hip to criticize airline food, it was actually pretty good back then. (The jaded “gourmets” of the era who found fault with being served caviar, smoked salmon, Chateaubriand carved to order at seatside, and chocolate mousse while winging across the globe at 30,000 feet in an elongated aluminum cigar tube sadly missed the point.)

The early 747 jumbo jets had a pianist and singer in the upstairs lounge (Frank Sinatra Jr. headlined one of the inaugural flights). It was all first class no matter where you sat, baby, primo, top-notch, top-drawer, and topflight.

And, oh, those stewardesses. They were the crème de la crème of young womanhood, classy and cool, every hair in place, and with smiles as wide as a runway. The airlines set the bar high, and these lovely, bright, pleasant young women made sure they were up to the challenge on every flight—uniforms perfectly fitted and without a wrinkle, white gloves spotless, hats worn jauntily on their perfectly coiffed heads, confident as they strode through airports around the world, aware that admiring eyes were on them every minute and basking in the adoration. Dating an airline stewardess was like dating a nubile Hollywood starlet or lithesome runway model: “I’m dating a stewardess!” It was a credential men wore proudly, like driving a Ferrari or eating at “21.”

And why not? These were special women, not only because they looked great, but because they were adventuresome, spending their working lives racing through the air high above where we mortals played out our mundane days, laying over in exotic places, bringing clothes back from Paris or Singapore to their small apartments at home base, conversing comfortably with on-board celebrities, and worldly-wise to every game any man has ever tried to play with a woman.

Today, they’re called flight attendants, a change in nomenclature brought about by the influx of male cabin attendants. But back when I wrote
Coffee, Tea or Me?
they were stewardesses, and the airlines were quick to market their obvious appeal to the traveling public. They were known as “stews,” and they lived together in “stew zoos.” The hordes of men pursuing their affections were known as “stew-bums.”

Coffee, Tea or Me?
is about them, these objects of male adoration back when flying was fun—and yes, even glamorous.