During its period as TAA, the company played a major part in the development of the Australian domestic air transport industry.

It was also at the time TAA supported the Flying Doctor Services of Australia by providing aircraft, pilots and engineers to ensure every emergency was answered quickly.

[1][2] In 1954 TAA became the first airline outside Europe to introduce the Vickers Viscount, and in 1981 it introduced the Airbus A300, the first wide-body aircraft to be purchased by an Australian domestic airline providing TAA with a clear edge over a major competitor at the time, Ansett which had purchased instead, the Boeing 767-200, receiving the type approximately a year later.

With its tiny population of about seven million, Australia ranked sixth in the world for scheduled air mileage, had 16 airlines, was growing at twice the world average and had produced a number of prominent aviation pioneers, including Lawrence Hargrave, Harry Hawker, Bert Hinkler, Lawrence Wackett, the Reverend John Flynn, Sidney Cotton, Keith Virtue and Charles Kingsford Smith.

In keeping with the Labor government's socialist leanings, the bill declared that the licenses of private operators would lapse for those routes that were adequately serviced by the national carrier.

However, a legal challenge, backed by the Liberal opposition and business interests generally, was successful and in December 1945, the High Court ruled that the Commonwealth did not have the power to prevent the issue of airline licenses to private companies.

With the bill suitably amended to remove the monopoly provisions, the Australian National Airways Commission came into existence in February 1946.

The Commission decided on the name "Trans-Australia Airlines", applied to the Treasury for a preliminary advance of £10,000 and set about making plans, recruiting staff, and purchasing equipment.

Holyman was not willing to sell, nor to work for a government-owned body, but was interested in setting up a "composite company", the details of which proposal remained unclear.

In July, the Treasury released £350,000 to allow TAA to order four larger, more modern Douglas DC-4s in the United States, and Brain appointed Aubrey Koch (from Qantas) as Senior Pilot DC4 Skymaster and John Watkins as Chief Technical Officer.

He later wrote: To my utter astonishment Arthur Coles, after the expected pep-talk about the DC-4 assignment, said he was relying on me to find out what new equipment was being developed that would enable us to offer our passengers a better product than our established rival, at a competitive price.It was typical of Coles, who knew nothing about aircraft, to reason that quality equipment would be vital, and then select the best man for the job of finding it and be prepared to back his judgement.

Britain's wartime Prime Minister Winston Churchill had been enormously popular during the darkest hours but was voted out at the first post-war opportunity.

We start next Monday.After a week of frantic effort hiring staff, borrowing a tin shed at the RAAF base at Laverton because Essendon Airport had been turned into mud by heavy rain, creating operations manuals, passenger manifests, tickets, and load sheets — even making passenger steps and baggage carts because there was no time to buy them in the ordinary way — Captains Hepburn and Nickels took off from Laverton at 5:45 am bound for Sydney.

Popular with the travelling public because of its ability to fly above much of the weather, it was really this aircraft that established the airline's reputation for excellence and service reliability.

Vickers Viscount turboprop aircraft were introduced in the 1950s and again proved immensely popular as a result of their smooth, vibration-free ride.

Although government-owned, the Liberal conservative government of the 1950s had a philosophical leaning towards the needs of the privately owned Ansett and the requirements of TAA suffered as a result.

The policy was so strict that even newly purchased identical aircraft (one from each airline) were required on their delivery flights to enter Australian airspace at exactly the same time.

[citation needed] The conservative government's benevolent attitude towards Ansett was epitomised in the 1950s when it forced TAA to swap a number of its popular turbo-prop Viscount aircraft with Ansett-ANA in return for slower and older, piston-engined Douglas DC-6Bs.

[11] The Two Airlines Policy was marginally relaxed in the early 1980s when TAA was able to introduce the Airbus A300B4, whilst Ansett chose to purchase the Boeing 767.

[12] Australian Airlines was the travel sponsor for the television shows Neighbours, Wheel of Fortune and Sale of the Century between late 1987 and 1994.

The Federal Government, although technically having deregulated the domestic aviation sector, made it effectively impossible for new entrant Compass Airlines to succeed.

[15] A seemingly well-orchestrated plan saw the Compass aircraft quickly flown out of the country and, with them, potentially the demise of a truly deregulated domestic aviation sector.

Throughout this period of transformation and deregulation, Australian Airlines continued its successful run by posting healthy profits, increasing passenger loads and gained much favour from its catchy television commercials.

Subsequently the government offered the entire merged operation in a public float, after selling a cornerstone 25% stake to British Airways, returning Qantas to the stock market after being absent from listing since 1947.

In October 2002, Qantas revived the Australian Airlines brand as a full-service carrier, targeting the low-cost leisure market and flying primarily out of Cairns and Bali.

The museum displays artefacts from the life of TAA/Australian including service ware, uniforms, advertisements, and photographs and is open to the public during the week.