twa's corporate history dates from july 16, 1930, and the forced merger of transcontinental air transport (tat), western air express (wae), maddux air lines, standard, and pittsburgh aviation industries corporation (paic) to form transcontinental & western air (t&wa) on 1 oct. 1930. the companies merged at the urging of postmaster general walter folger brown, who was looking for bigger airlines to give airmail contracts to.