AA History: Oldest Flight with Unchanged Flight Number
 

I was watching Clear and Present Danger the other day and they mentioned that Jack Ryan was arriving in Bogota on AA 915 at 7:50 PM. I checked to see what AA 915 currently is and it is still MIA-BOG, though the scheduled arrival is slightly later.

That movie was from 1994.

Got me thinking: what's the oldest flight you can recall where the flight number (and even the timing) is the same?

Amazon Prime has the 1951 movie "Three Guys Named Mike" about a new stewardess for AA. Maybe you can pick some flight numbers out of it.
I think she was flying mostly on DC-6

My money is one AA1, which has been a morning JFK-LAX nonstop from at least the early 60's.

AA1 also has the dubious distinction of having had three fatal crashes -- although the first two were on prop planes before there even was a JFK (or IDL) Airport.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amer...lines_Flight_1

Wow, Linda McCartney's mother died in that crash

LCY-JFK is quite new, isn't it?

Correct. BA1 was a Concorde flight to JFK for decades.

I agree that AA 1 is probably the winner. AA 50/51 (DFW<->LHR) has been around since the early 80s, although it was originally to LGW.

When AA added four-digit flight numbers, some long-time flight numbers were changed.

When did JFK/CDG first become AA 44/45?

Are you sure? 1st 2 airlines don't seem to have one - WY and CX

BA1 is a new route - until 2013 it was a LHR-JFK Concorde service

Here’s an old timetable dated June 1, 1936 when the DC aircraft started in service and offered sleeper service. Technically lie flat, but more like Pullman bunks than lie flat seats.

And here’s a May 1,1948 depicting an American Overseas Airlines Lockheed L-049 Constellation used in transatlantic service. The technical stop required in Shannon had people getting off the aircraft while it was serviced (100-130 octane aviation gasoline, not nice calm Jet A, you wanted to get off). “All these wealthy people traveling through Shannon,” thought caterer Brendan O'Regan. And Ireland was financially poor but had Whiskey, beautiful lace, Belleek chinaware, Irish woolens, Waterford crystal and more.

Until that time cruise ship passengers were the ones who benefitted from duty free shopping.What are airplanes, he argued, but ships of the air? And what are airline passengers but sailors of the clouds? Why should they pay tax? In 1947, the Irish government agreed and let him try it out here. The rest is history...

(By that time I had flown in an AA DC-3 MEX-MTY-SAT.)

Link to more AA timetables from the World Airline Historical Society.

CX doesn't use single or double digit flight numbers afaik, their "flight 1" equivalent would be CX100, SYD-HKG.
WY is basically the same, WY101 is the better timed of the two MCT-LHR flights.

Random, but I do wish SQ renumbered their EWR-SIN service to SQ1/SQ2. Instead, the comparatively uninteresting SFO-HKG-SIN route holds that number.