As airline travel grew rapidly from the mid-1960s onwards the Boeing Company in America sought to develop a long range, wide-body aircraft which could carry a large number of passengers and meet predicted future demand for air travel. Production of the first 747 began in the spring of 1967 and by the autumn of 1968 the first aircraft came off the production line; within half a year the first development flight had taken place on 9th February 1969.

On 21st January 1970 the first production 747 aircraft, designated a 747-100, flew in commercial service with American airline Pan-Am. Developed and refined over twenty five years, with new specification aircraft introduced, 747 aircraft have carried over 3.5 billion passengers across the world while airline cargo companies, using over two-hundred aircraft, carry over half the world's air freight.

The Boeing 747 is affectionately known as the "Jumbo Jet" and, along with Concorde, is one of the world's most recognised and loved aircraft. Well over a thousand aircraft have entered service with airlines across the globe and she is the work-horse of the skies, carrying many thousands of passengers each year. This website contains a history, specification and photo galleries of a retired Lufthansa Boeing 747 230 D-ABYM, preserved at the Auto & Technik Muuseum in Speyer, Germany.