Cyril C. Thompson (1892-1976) had a long career in the accounting, management and public relations sides of the aviation industry, joining near the beginning of commercial aviation in 1928 and retiring just as the era of commercial jets began. Thompson was as an executive of United Air Lines for eighteen years, and later an airport planner, consultant, and prolific author and speaker.

Cyril Clowes Thompson was born October 30, 1892 in Joliet, Illinois; son of James M. Thompson (1866-1948) and Anna Marie (Clowes) Thompson (1867-1945). He received his early education there, attended Beloit College from 1910 to 1912 and, later, studied law at the University of Nebraska from 1914 to 1917. He began his professional career as Assistant Chemist with U.S. Steel Corporation from 1912 to 1914. During World War I he served with the 24th Machine Gun Battalion, 8th Division, U.S. Army until 1918.

After the war, Thompson homesteaded a 160 acre ranch in Idaho and worked in a variety of jobs, including as a journalist and Chief Deputy State Auditor of Idaho from 1923 to 1928. Poor roads and difficult travel conditions in the vast spaces of Idaho led him to an interest in the newly developing field of commercial air transportation. Varney Air Lines, Inc. had been founded in Boise in 1926 and became affiliated with the vertical combination of airplane manufacturing and air transport enterprises being organized by William Boeing (1881-1956) of Seattle. In 1929 the Boeing and Pratt & Whitney interests were consolidated through the medium of a holding company, United Aircraft & Transport Corporation, and in 1931, its aircraft operations were combined as United Air Lines, Inc. Through the Air Mail Act of 1934, the Roosevelt Administration broke up the combinations encouranged by the Hoover Administration, and United Aircraft & Transport was divided into two manufacturing companies, the present United Technologies and Boeing, and United Air Lines, Inc.

In 1928 Thompson became the Business Manager for the new Boeing School of Aeronautics, a division of Boeing Air Transport, Inc. located in Oakland, California He joined United Air Lines Inc. as a Tax Agent in 1931; became Corporate Secretary and Director 1934; Executive Assistant to company president W.A. Patterson (1899-1980), 1936; and Vice President, Public Relations of United Air Lines Transport Corporation in 1940, a position from which he resigned in 1947. He then became a consultant and special representative for Santa Fe Skyways which provided air freight service for the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railway. In 1948 be became Executive Secretary, and later Executive Director from 1949 to 1954, of the Airport Operators Council in Washington D.C.

Thompson also served as an airport consultant to the Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association; Director and President of the National Aeronautic Association; President of the Idaho Airways Association; Commander of the Boise Post of the American Legion; and a member of the American Legion Special National Aviation Commission.

He married Vivian Grace Ditto (1892-1975), July 19, 1917 and they had four daughters - Dawn Thompson Weston (1919-2015), Betty Thompson Schwering (1920-2004), Rachael Thompson Ohman (1921-), and Eleanor Thompson (1934-). Thompson died July 4, 1976.