Originally Posted by acl65pilot

The story I head was this:

Back in the day all airlines were Air Lines or airways. All of the other airlines were found guilty of price colusion et al and had to basically become different entites, so they went from Air Lines to Airlines. DAL wasnot part of the CAB's findings at the time and therefore kept the Air Lines and did not have to go to airlines like the rest of the companies.

It was during the CAB if I recall correctly.

I recall something along these lines from one of the CAB courses I took in college as well, but that has been many years ago, and I am too lazy to go find my text books in the basement!