In the 1920s and 30s the airlines were just beginning. It was unusual for people to travel by air because it was expensive and dangerous. In those days, there were no flight attendants to look after the passengers. Young men ,or “stewards” helped the passengers onto the airplane and carried the passengers’ luggage(行李)but they did not provide food and drinks. But then in 1930,a woman called Ellen Church invented the “stewardess”.
Ellen Church was born in 1904 on a farm in Iowa. She was a different child. She didn’t want to work on a farm or marry a farmer —she wanted a more adventurous(冒险的)life. Ellen studied to be a nurse at the University of Minnesota and then got a job in a hospital. For the next few years she stayed at the hospital but also took flying lessons and got her pilot’s license.
Ellen was twenty-five years old when she first got in touch with Boeing Air Transport. She loved flying but she understood that airlines were a man’s world. Although women like Emelia Earheart were becoming famous, she realized it was impossible for a woman to have a career as a pilot .But she had another idea. Most people were frightened of flying because. flying was still an unreliable(不可靠的) way to travel. There were often delays(延误),many crashes and the bad weathers made many passengers sick. Ellen thought nurses could take care of passengers during flights and B.A.T. agreed.
The young woman from Iowa and seven other nurses became the first air stewardesses.
At first pilots were unhappy because they did not want stewardesses on airplanes, but passengers loved the stewardesses. In 1940 there were around 1000 of them working for different airlines. The early “stewardesses” had to be under twenty-five-year-old, single and slim. When a woman joined an airline, she had to promise not to get married or have children. It was hard job and not well paid. They worked long hours and earned ＄1 an hour.
In the 1970s, stewardesses were unhappy in their job and airlines had to make some changes. Since the 1970s, “stewardesses” have been called flight attendants. They are well paid and work fewer hours than in the past.
小题1:The last sentence of the first paragraph suggests that _________.
A．the word “stewardess” was made up by Ellen Church
B．Ellen Church was the first woman who flew a plane
C．Ellen Church was the first woman who worked on a plane
D．Ellen Church was the first woman passenger on a plane小题2:From the second paragraph, we learn that ________.
A．Ellen did not behave in the same way as most as other girls
B．Ellen’s family was not rich enough to support her education
C．Ellen was fond of working as a nurse in the hospital
D．Ellen has an unhappy childhood that changed her completely小题3:The main reason for Boeing Air Transport offering Ellen the job was ________.
A．her flying experience
B．her university education
C．her nursing experience
D．her life attitudes小题4:According to the passage, in the 1940s a woman had to ________ if she wanted to be a stewardess.
A．be a nurse
B．be married
C．be a mother
D．be young小题5:The passage mainly talks about _______.
A．the background of early flying pilots
B．the experience of flying passengers
C．the history of early flight attendants
D．the development of airplanes
