Midwest Express Pilot Hat Badge 1st Issue

Milwaukee, WI 1984-2010

In 1948, Kimberly-Clark Corporation started a Corporate Flight division. KC Aviation was a spin off that performed maintenance. Midwest Express Airlines was started on June 11, 1984 by KC Aviation. In 1989, Midwest Express also started their own regional subsidiary, Skyway Airlines . In 2002, the airline shortened it's name from Midwest Express Airlines to Midwest Airlines and in 2003, Skyway Airlines name changed to Midwest Connect. The airline experienced steady growth along with continued profitability. After fourteen years of profit-making, Midwest Express was affected with serious financial problems after the September 11 terrorist attacks. To return to profitability, the airline made major changes. The recovery to profitability never occured. In early 2008 the airline's publicly traded parent, Midwest Air Group, was taken over by a private investment firm with a minority investment by Northwest Airlines (now Delta Airlines). The new owners halted airline operations by Midwest Skyway Airlines subsidiary and contracted out all Midwest Connect flights. Skyway went on to provide ground services for Midwest flights. On June 23, 2009, Republic Airways acquired Midwest Airlines. In early 2010, the parent company, Republic Airways Holdings, announced that its Frontier and Midwest Airlines brands would merge by October 2010 and the Frontier Airlines name would be kept. Midwest Airline was shut down by the end of October 2010.