American Airlines Celebrates Mechanic's 70 Years of Service Mary Altaffer/Associated Press Al Blackman, 86, sat behind the pilots in a restored American Airlines DC-3 as it flew around New York in his honor Wednesday. After decades of loyal service from their employees, many companies will reward them with a gold watch or a silver pen. When Al Blackman celebrated his anniversary with American Airlines this week, the company took him flying. It was not just any flight. On Wednesday, Mr. Blackman was treated to scenic views of New York from a fully restored DC-3, a plane flown by the airline between 1936 and 1947. Then again, it was not any anniversary. Mr. Blackman had just completed 70 years on the job. "I think they wanted an antique to fly in the antique," Mr. Blackman said. When a reporter asked him when he planned to retire, Mr. Blackman, who is 86, joked, "I thought this was retirement." Mr. Blackman has not had the most romantic of airline jobs, but it is certainly among the most important. He has worked as a mechanic, turning wrenches on more than a dozen different models of airplanes, from noisy propeller-powered planes that hopped across the country, stopping along the way for fuel, to wide-body jets capable of crossing oceans. He even worked on helicopters during his time in the Army during the Korean War. And as aviation has evolved, so has Mr. Blackman. "You should see him working on the computer," said Pete Trapani, a co-worker. As a crew chief at American's maintenance hangar at Kennedy International Airport, responsible for the supervision of airplane maintenance, such technology is a key part of Mr. Blackman's job. But it is clear that he prefers more hands-on work. "I've never seen a computer get out and fix an airplane," he said to Mr. Trapani. On Wednesday's flight, Mr. Blackman was seated in the cockpit behind the pilots as the DC-3 attracted camera-wielding airport workers eager to record the sight of the propeller plane lined up for takeoff at Kennedy amid modern jetliners. The DC-3 is an unpressurized airplane that in its day flew 21 passengers at speeds of about 200 miles an hour at an altitude of 10,000 feet. As the propellers shook the airplane, it took off and soon was flying north along the Hudson River. Over Midtown, the pilots turned the plane east over Central Park at an altitude of 1,500 feet, drawing the attention of people in the park. Even the pilots, Dave Buffington of Texas and Gene Christian of Georgia, were surprised that air traffic controllers allowed them to fly the route. As it flew over Manhattan, the plane passed the former site of Aviation High School on East 63rd Street, where Mr. Blackman graduated from a three-year aviation and mechanics program to begin his airline career at age 16. "I never thought of it as work," said Mr. Blackman, who lives in Brooklyn. His wife, before she died, used to say that when he left for work, he was "going to play with his friends," he said. On Tuesday many of those friends gathered in the hangar, along with Mr. Blackman's children and grandchildren, to see the surprise his employer had arranged. The DC-3 was parked inside, painted in its original colors and buffed to a blinding shine, outfitted as if the calendar had stopped in 1940. "It is the oldest flying DC-3," said Zane Lemon, the president of the Flagship Detroit Foundation. The foundation owns the plane, which American dubbed the Flagship Detroit when it was the 32nd airplane in the company's fleet. Mr. Lemon described the DC-3"s contribution to commercial aviation history as "priceless." Getting the plane to New York was seen by American Airlines as a fitting gift to its longest-serving employee. Mr. Blackman's co-workers had their own tribute. Last weekend, while Mr. Blackman enjoyed his days off, Alfredo Oyague Jr., a mechanic who also works as an artist, was high up on a lift with a partner, Elizer Pagan, painting a mural on the wall of the hangar. Unveiled on Tuesday, Mr. Blackman's image beams from the center, surrounded by a representative history of air travel from the B-14 "flying boat" to the soon-to-be-in-service Boeing 787 Dreamliner. The planes that pass under Mr. Blackman's hands may change, but the mural will remain. "It will be here forever," Mr. Trapani said. This bay is dedicated to Al.