Colgan Air was an American regional airline headquartered in Memphis, Tennessee. The airline was a subsidiary of Pinnacle Airlines Corporation, which also owned Pinnacle Airlines (now named Endeavor Air). Colgan predominantly operated services on behalf of Continental Express, United Express, and US Airways Express. In 2012, Pinnacle Airlines Corporation decided to abolish the Colgan brand name, and therefore all of Colgan's assets were transferred over to sister airline Pinnacle.
Founding
Charles J. Colgan founded the Colgan Airways Corporation in 1965 at Manassas Airport (MNZ) near Washington D.C. His company would be a fixed base operator at the Virginia airport, offering services such as aircraft maintenance, aircraft refueling, hangaring and more.
In 1986, Colgan was awarded an airline contract with New York Air. Colgan's airline would operate under the brand name New York Air Connection, and would fly passengers between Dutchess County Airport (POU) near Poughkeepsie, NY and Manassas. For this service, Colgan operated a mixture of Beechcraft Model 99s, Beechcraft 1900Cs, and Short 330s.
On February 1st, 1987, New York Air merged with Continental. Therefore, Colgan now operated as part of Continental Express, rather than with New York Air Connection. Colgan was later sold to fellow Continental Express operator Presidential Airways, which mostly operated out of Washington Dulles International Airport (IAD). In 1988, both Colgan and Presidential switched to operating under the United Express brand name, but this only lasted for one year because Presidential filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy just one year later in 1989.
The rebuild
Following the collapse of Presidential, Charles J. Colgan decided to revive his airline with his son, Michael J. Colgan. They decided to use the name National Capitol, and began service between Washington Dulles (IAD) and Binghamton, NY (BGM). Later, the father-son team decided to rename the airline and adopted the name Colgan Air. Colgan Air then began to operate for Continental Airlines once again in 1997, albeit under the Continental Connection banner.
Two years later in 1999, Colgan Air exited its partnership with Continental, instead flying services for US Airways Express. Colgan, at this time, was mostly flying out of New York-LaGuardia (LGA), Pittsburgh (PIT), and Boston (BOS), which were major cities served by US Airways. However, in 2005, Colgan decided to rejoin the Continental family by flying some of its regional services out of Houston-Intercontinental (IAH). By October 2005, Colgan's Continental contract had expanded to Washington-Dulles, serving Charleston, WV (CRW), Westchester, NY (HPN), and Allentown, PA (ABE).
Acquisition by Pinnacle
Colgan was purchased by Pinnacle Airlines Corporation in 2007 for $20 million. However, Colgan's regional operations would remain separate from Pinnacle Airlines. This was a strategic move to allow Pinnacle access to Colgan's partners, which at the time included Continental, United, and US Airways.
In 2009, in order to facilitate further cooperation between Pinnacle and Colgan, Colgan's headquarters were relocated from Manassas, VA to Memphis, TN. In the following year, Pinnacle decided to absorb the Colgan brand under the Pinnacle banner, thereby cutting down marketing and operation costs. Colgan's last revenue flight was in September 2012 on a flight from Washington-Dulles (IAD) to Albany, NY (ALB).