Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport.
Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport
Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport officially turned 90 this year and it’s flying higher than ever. More than 52 million passengers moved through its terminals in 2024, the busiest year in Phoenix Sky Harbor history. Within the last year, it’s also been named one of the nation’s top airports. It’s also gotten new lounges and other passenger amenities. A brand-new terminal is set to break ground in 2030.
Needless to say, the Valley’s largest airport has come a long way since its dusty beginnings.
Back in 1928, aviator J. Parker Van Zandt bought 278 acres east of downtown for his company Scenic Airways. He built a single hangar and a dirt runway, naming the fledgling airport Sky Harbor. Less than a year later, the stock market crash forced Van Zandt to sell the property.
A Ford Tri-Motor airplace owned by the Standard Oil Company at Phoenix Sky Harbor in the late 1920s.
Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport
By 1935, the city of Phoenix purchased Sky Harbor for $100,000 and started expanding, including constructing a new runway. The airport quickly became the city’s gateway as carriers like TWA began service to the Valley and Arizona grew as a tourist destination.
World War II brought Army Air Corps training flights, which toughened the runways and boosted the airport’s strategic importance.
The postwar boom and the ensuing jet age reshaped Sky Harbor. Longer runways and nonstop commercial service to far-flung destinations transformed the airport. As Phoenix ditched its sleepy desert-town image, a growing number of travelers were greeted by sleek new terminals.
Phoenix Sky Harbor Airport in the 1950s.
Terminal 1 was built in the early 1950s at a cost of $835,000, giving passengers a modern experience. The adjacent Terminal 2 followed in 1962, boasting polished terrazzo floors and Paul Coze’s iconic mosaic mural, “The Phoenix.” By then, Sky Harbor was welcoming upward of a million passengers a year.
Terminal 3 arrived in 1979, handling soaring passenger traffic and nonstop flights. By the 1980s, Sky Harbor became a flagship airport for the now-defunct America West Airlines. Terminal 4 opened in the early 1990s, expanding international service and securing Sky Harbor’s role as the Valley’s aviation hub for millions of travelers.
In honor of the theme of our annual Best of Phoenix issue, here’s a photo retrospective of Phoenix Sky Harbor.
Student pilots from the U.S. Army Air Force next to their Consolidated PT-1 Trusty biplanes in the late 1920s.
Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport
A group of female passengers next to their Standard Airlines Fokker Tri-motor airplane during a stopover at Sky Harbor in the 1920s.
Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport
Amelia Earhart at Phoenix Sky Harbor in 1930. The famed aviatrix landed at the airport after experiencing engine trouble while flying to Los Angeles.
Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport
Sky Harbor’s North Terminal hangar and tower in the 1930s.
Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport
A look inside the Sky Harbor tower in the 1940s.
Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport
Former Arizona Governor Howard Pyle at Sky Harbor Airport in 1945.
An undated photo of the observation deck at Sky Harbor.
Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport
An aerial photo of Sky Harbor’s Terminal 1 after its opening in the early 1950s.
Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport
An aviation service technician greets passengers at Sky Harbor’s Transient Terminal in the ’50s.
Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport
A unique angle of Sky Harbor’s tower in the 1950s.
Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport
A vintage photo of Terminal 1 at Sky Harbor Airport from 1952.
Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport
An American Airlines plane at Sky Harbor in 1958.
Sky Harbor’s Terminal 2 opened in 1962 and featured polished terrazzo floors and other stylish decor.
Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport
An exterior view of Terminal 2 at Sky Harbor and its 1,000-car parking lot.
Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport
Paul Coze’s iconic mosaic mural “The Phoenix” was a centerpiece of Terminal 2. The 75-feet-wide triptych was moved to Sky Harbor’s Rental Car Center after the terminal’s closure in 2020.
Flight attendants chat with a passenger aboard a Western Airlines plane at Sky Harbor in 1964.
Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport
Martin Luther King Jr. arrives at Phoenix Sky Harbor Airport in June 1964 prior to giving a speech at Arizona State University.”
Ragsdale Family Papers, MSS-451, Arizona State University Library.
Skycaps greet and assist passengers outside of Sky Harbor’s Terminal 2 in the 1970s.
Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport
A six-sided television kiosk inside Phoenix Sky Harbor’s Terminal 2 in the early 1970s.
Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport
A group of American Airlines skycaps at Sky Harbor in 1975.
Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport
A car rental counter at Sky Harbor Airport in the mid-1970s.
Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport
An undated photo shows a British Airways Concorde at Phoenix Sky Harbor, which began welcoming the supersonic jet in 1978.
Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport
Members of Phoenix Sky Harbor’s volunteer auxiliary program gathered around a fountain inside Terminal 3 in the 1980s.
Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport
A 1983 photo of an America West Airlines Boeing 707 at Phoenix Sky Harbor Airport, the carrier’s main hub from its founding in 1981 until its merger with US Airways in the 2000s.
Aero Icarus/CC BY-SA 2.0/Wikimedia Commons
The sign for Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport in 1984.
An American Airlines flight carrying the Dallas Cowboys to the Valley in 1996 for Super Bowl XXX.
Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport