Julia Cooke

Julia Cooke, an American journalist and nonfiction author, has written for publications including Smithsonian, Condé Nast Traveler, and the Virginia Quarterly Review. Come Fly The World reconstructs the jet-age history of Pan Am through the experiences of women who worked as flight attendants during the 1960s and 1970s. Drawing on interviews and archival research, Cooke connects international travel with changing expectations around work, independence, and public image. She follows their work from recruitment and training through international routes, showing how Pan Am's public image could both widen and constrain their opportunities. The book also traces several women through Pan Am's role in Operation Babylift at the end of the Vietnam War. By keeping individual lives in view, Cooke turns a corporate history into a study of mobility, labor, and changing expectations. She previously wrote The Other Side of Paradise about life in contemporary Cuba.