Background

Najeeb Elias Halaby was born on November 19, 1915, in Dallas, Texas. His father was Najeeb Elias Halaby, Sr., a Syrian Christian, who immigrated to the United States from Syria in 1891.

Education

Halaby attended Stanford University, where he earned his Bachelor of Arts in 1937, followed by law school at the University of Michigan and Yale University, where he graduated with a Bachelor of Laws in 1940.

Career

Training as a pilot while a teenager, Halaby worked for the Lockheed Aircraft Corp. for a year before joining the U.S. Navy during World War II as a test pilot of such planes as the Messerschmitt Me262, Focke-Wulf FW190, and Bell XP59 jet. After the war, he worked as an advisory to the U.S. Secretary of Defense and then as deputy assistant for international security for the U.S. State Department.

During the 1950s Halaby also worked for L. S. Rockefeller & Bros. from 1953 to 1956 and was secretary-treasurer and counsel for Aerospace Corp. and president of American Technology Corp. After practicing as a private attorney for two years, in 1961, Halaby was appointed by President John F. Kennedy as head of the Federal Aviation Agency (FAA), making him the highest-ranking Arab American in government at the time.

Some of his accomplishments while with the FAA including creating closer ties with the Civil Aeronautics Board and establishing the U.S. Flight Academy in Oklahoma City. In 1968, he was hired as president of Pan American Airlines, becoming chairman and chief executive officer the next year.

While with Pan Am, Halaby encouraged the use jumbo jets, which he correctly predicted would become a popular means of transportation, though he incorrectly predicted that supersonic jets would become the rage in later years. Halaby also pressed for better treatment of minorities within Pan Am and worked to increase security in light of the growing risks of hijackings during the 1960s. When Pan Am found itself in financial trouble, however, Halaby became the scapegoat and was fired in 1972.

Halaby went on to found Halaby International Corp. in 1973, and DartRail in 1980. His interest in railway systems also led to his chairmanship of Dulles Access Rapid Transit, Inc., from 1985 until 1998. Halaby spent his final years doing charity work as chair of the Save the Children Foundation from 1992 to 1998. Halaby was the author of Crosswinds: An Airman's Memoir (1978).

Achievements

• Najeeb Halaby is known for making the first transcontinental jet flight in the United States history. He was a president, chairman, and chief executive officer of Pan American World Airways.

Works

More photos

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  • Crosswinds: An airman's memoir 1978

Personality

Despite his accomplishments in the transportation field, Halaby perhaps gained his greatest fame as the father of Lisa Halaby, who became Jordan's Queen Noor in 1978, thus making Halaby King Hussein I's father-in-law.

Connections

Halaby was married three times. He married Doris Carlquist in Washington, D.C., on December 24, 1945, but they divorced in 1977. They had three children - daughter Lisa, who became Queen of Jordan in 1978; son Christian; and daughter Alexa.

Then, Halaby was married to Jane Allison Coates from 1980 until her death in 1996. From 1997 until his death in 2003 at age 87, he was married to Libby Anderson Cater.

Father:

Najeeb Elias Halaby

March 17, 1878/1880 - December 16, 1928

Mother:

Laura (Wilkins) Halaby

Spouse:

Libby Anderson Cater

Daughter:

Lisa Halaby

Noor Al-Hussein (23 August 1951) is the queen dowager of Jordan as the widow of King Hussein. She was his fourth spouse and queen consort between their marriage in 1978 and his death in 1999.

Son:

Christian Halaby

Daughter:

Alexa Halaby

late-spouse:

Jane Allison Coates Frick

Died in 1996.

ex-spouse:

Doris Carlquist

References

• The Arab Americans: A History Uses historical narrative, personal memoir, and profiles based on interviews to describe the Arab American experience from the mid-nineteenth century to the present.
  2005