Ghana Airways: The External Services, November 1962

During the same time frame as yesterday's newspaper advert, boasting of a Second-generation jet service from Ghana Airways, the above map showed the extent of the airline's international network, or as it uniquely says here, its "External Services."

The route includes the classic West African littoral ply from Lagos to Dakar via Abidjan, Monrovia (Robertsfield), Freetown, Conakry, and Bathurst. Also included in West Africa is hops north to Ouagadougou and Bamako, the second of which interestingly continues north to Tunis, then Zürich followed by Prague, and finally ending at Moscow. This was the era when President Kwame Nkrumah was courting Eastern overtures as well as Western in the immediate post-independence period. This triangulation would manifest itself most visibly at Ghana Airways, which received a handful of Illyushin Il-18s, as can be seen at lower left underneath the Dougla DC-3s and in adjacent corners from its other fleet types, the British Vickers Viscount and Bristol Brittania. The Soviet props were employed only for Ghana Airway's intra-African routes, such as the stretches to Khartoum and Cairo which then went on to Beirut on a weekly basis.

But Ghana's back was not turned away from its colonial parent, as can be seen from the air company's dual routes to London, one via Tripoli and Rome, the other direct non-stop, the longest route for the company at the time.

This item has been reposted from the incredible website Timetable Images, as is from the collection of Bjorn Larsson. The Timetablist would like to thank Timetable Images and Mr. Larsson for generously allowing reposting.