Volunteer Spotlight Trudi Lang - Flying the Friendly Skies of Midway The decades between the 1950s and 1970s are considered by many as the “golden age” of airline travel. Flying on a commercial airliner was widely seen as a special occasion, and flight crews were often portrayed with the same level of glamor as the Hollywood elite. Following her pioneering 30-year career with United Airlines, Trudi Lang brought her trailblazing spirit, along with finely honed sense of elegance and sophistication to the USS Midway Museum. Celebrating two decades of leadership with the safety department, she’s been instrumental in building a volunteer corps at the museum that is the envy of San Diego. “I was so fascinated and stunned by the magnificence of Midway, that I wanted to be part of it,” remembered Lang, who joined the Midway family only a year after the museum opened to the public. “I applied to volunteer in the safety department in 2005. Back then everything was new, but as a safety professional with United Airlines, the idea of "safety first” was solidly ingrained in me.” A San Diego native, Lang started as a stewardess in 1970, with a position title change to flight attendant a few years later. Regardless of her designation, the travel bug dug deep and stayed a powerful force for 33 years.
“I knew the Midway was here and I wanted to visit,” said Lang, who has amassed more than 10,300 volunteer hours. “My father was a Navy lieutenant commander. He passed away in 1976, but I knew he would have loved this, so I guess volunteering for Midway was mainly a way to honor my dad.” What she found at Midway in the earliest days of the museum was a blank canvas. Her decades of ensuring safe and enjoyable experiences for millions of airline passengers made her the perfect volunteer to help build Midway’s safety department. “We had no formal training then, and very few safety volunteers, so learning what to do was really up to us to figure out,” said Lang. “It was challenging. I did orientation for new safety volunteers for many years and also wrote a simple safety training program with the help of my dear friend and safety lead Carole Hansen.” Lang’s efforts and dedication did not go unnoticed, and she quickly rose in the ranks of Midway’s volunteer safety team. “I was encouraged in 2006 to become a safety lead,” said Lang. “I saw a need for some organization for our leads, and our team, and having been a purser with the airlines, I applied those skills to give us some structure.”
“I wanted the adventure, and I got it,” said Lang, who was based in Chicago, Denver and finally Los Angeles while with United Airlines. “The travel, and meeting and working with new people was what made me stay. I’ve been to 42 states and 15 countries. Every flight was different, so it was never boring. I retired in 2003 as an international purser and in late 2004 I moved back to San Diego to be with my fiancé, Sam.” Once she moved back home, she found Midway and her second passion. 8 WWW.SanDiegoVeteransMagazine.com / August 2025
Trudi helps visitors during their visit to Midway.