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In 1943, members of the United States Army Air Forces – the predecessor to the U.S. Air Force – became concerned with relying on commercial airlines to transport the President. A C-87 Liberator Express was reconfigured for use as a presidential transport, but it was rejected by the Secret Service amid concerns over the aircraft's safety record. A C-54 Skymaster was then converted for presidential use. This aircraft, (nicknamed "the Sacred Cow") transported President Franklin D. Roosevelt to the Yalta Conference in February 1945, and was subsequently used for another two years by President Harry S. Truman.
On 11 October 1910, Theodore Roosevelt became the first former President to fly in an aircraft, a flight in an early Wright Flyer from Kinloch Field near St. Louis, Missouri. He was no longer in office, having been succeeded by William Howard Taft.
Prior to World War II, overseas and cross-country presidential travel was rare. Franklin Delano Roosevelt was the first president to fly in an aircraft while in office. During World War II, Roosevelt traveled on the Dixie Clipper, a Pan Am-crewed Boeing 314 flying boat to the 1943 Casablanca Conference, in Morocco, a flight that covered 5,500 miles. The presidential call sign was established for security purposes during the administration of Dwight D. Eisenhower. The change stemmed from a 1953 incident where an Eastern Airlines commercial flight (8610) had the same call sign as a flight the president was on (Air Force 8610). The aircraft accidentally entered the same airspace, and after the incident the unique call sign "Air Force One" was introduced for the presidential aircraft. The first official flight of Air Force One was in 1959 during the Eisenhower administration.
Eisenhower became the first president to use the VC-137 during his "Flight to Peace" Goodwill tour, from 3 December through 22 December 1959. He visited 11 Asian nations, flying 22,000 miles (35,000 km) in 19 days. A Boeing 707 SAM 26000 served Presidents Kennedy to Clinton, and was the primary transport from Kennedy to Nixon. John F. Kennedy used the Eisenhower-era jets for trips to Canada, France, Austria and the United Kingdom.
On 22 November 1963, the Boeing 707 SAM 26000 carried President Kennedy to Dallas, Texas, where it served as the backdrop as the Kennedys greeted well-wishers at Dallas' Love Field. Later that afternoon, Kennedy was assassinated, and Vice President Lyndon Johnson assumed the office of president and took the oath of office aboard the same place. At Johnson's request, the plane carried Kennedy's body back to Washington.
President Lyndon B. Johnson used SAM 26000 to travel extensively domestically, and used it to visit troops in South Vietnam during the Vietnam War. SAM 26000 served President Nixon on several groundbreaking overseas voyages, including his famous visit to the People's Republic of China in February 1972 and trip to the Soviet Union later that year, both firsts for an American president. Nixon dubbed the plane the "Spirit of '76" in honor of the upcoming centennial of the United States, and that logo was painted on both sides of the plane's nose.
Boeing 707 SAM 27000 served Presidents Nixon to George H. W. Bush, and was the primary transport for Nixon to Reagan. Richard Nixon was the first president to use SAM 27000, and the newer aircraft served every president until it was replaced by two VC-25 aircraft (SAM 28000 and 29000) in 1990. After announcing his intention to resign the presidency, Nixon boarded SAM 27000 to travel to California. After Gerald Ford was sworn in as president, the plane had to be redesignated as SAM 27000, indicating no president was on board the aircraft. Over Jefferson City, Missouri, Albertazzie radioed: "'Kansas City, this was Air Force One. Will you change our call sign to SAM 27000?' Back came the reply: 'Roger, SAM 27000. Good luck to the President.'"
SAM 27000's last flight as Air Force One was on 29 August 2001 when it flew President George W. Bush from San Antonio to Waco, Texas. Following the flight it was formally decommissioned then flown to San Bernardino International Airport in California. It was later dismantled and taken to the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library in Simi Valley, where it was reassembled and is on permanent display.
Following the September 11 attacks in 2001, President George W. Bush flew on a VC-25 from Sarasota-Bradenton International Airport with Colonel Mark Tillman, the senior pilot of Air Force One that day, in charge. Air traffic controllers gave Air Force One an ominous warning that a passenger jet was close to Air Force One and was unresponsive to calls. "As we got over Gainesville, Florida., we got the word from Jacksonville Center. They said, 'Air Force One you have traffic behind you and basically above you that is descending into you, we are not in contact with them – they have shut their responder off.' And at that time it kind of led us to believe maybe someone was coming into us in Sarasota, they saw us take off, they just stayed high and are following us at this point. We had no idea what the capabilities of the terrorists were at that point."
In response to this reported threat, Col. Tillman said he flew Air Force One out into the Gulf of Mexico to test whether the other aircraft would follow. The other jet continued on its route, and Tillman said that it was later explained to him that an airliner had lost its transponder and that the pilots on-board had neglected to switch to a new radio frequency. The transponder of a plane transmits an electronic identification signal of itself.
At this point, the plan to fly President Bush back to Washington, DC was aborted and instead Tillman landed at Barksdale Air Force Base, Louisiana and Offutt Air Force Base, Nebraska, where Bush made a speech. Tillman explained that this was due to his concern that Air Force One would be attacked. After the preliminary stops, the president was returned to Washington. The next day, officials at the White House and the Justice Department explained that President Bush did this because there was "specific and credible information that the White House and Air Force One were also intended targets."