“Frank Sinatra's Learjet was the first celebrity private jet.”
Verdict: Sinatra took delivery of a Learjet 23 in 1965 — serial number 31, named *Christina II* after his daughter — making him one of the first entertainers to own a business jet, and the first to make one part of his image. But Bing Crosby, Arthur Godfrey and Danny Kaye flew their own aircraft earlier, corporate JetStars were carrying the rich from 1961, and his wasn't even the first Learjet sold to a private individual. Best described as the first *famous* celebrity jet.
Bill Lear understood publicity, and Sinatra was the perfect customer: the Learjet 23 was small, fast, glamorous and slightly dangerous, and so was Sinatra. Christina II carried the Rat Pack between Palm Springs, Las Vegas and Los Angeles, flew Sinatra and Mia Farrow on their first date and their honeymoon, and, according to accounts from the period, took Marlon Brando and Sammy Davis Jr to Mississippi to join a civil-rights march. It logged more than 1,500 hours in two years.
The earlier claimants complicate the story. Arthur Godfrey, the radio and TV host, was an accomplished pilot who flew a DC-3 and later a JetStar. Danny Kaye held airline-transport ratings. Bing Crosby owned aircraft from the 1940s. The first business jets — the JetStar and the Sabreliner — entered service in 1961, four years before Sinatra's Learjet, and were owned by corporations and the occasional tycoon.
What Sinatra did was turn a jet into a prop. The Learjet appeared in photographs, gossip columns and eventually in the mythology of the 1960s; Lear reportedly enjoyed the marketing more than the sale. The aircraft was later sold and, with a new owner, crashed in 1970s service.
So: an early adopter, a legendary owner, and the reason 'Learjet' became a synonym for celebrity — but not the first.
Sources: robbreport.com · bjtonline.com · en.wikipedia.org
Aircraft in this story