I'm pretty sure the two widebodies at the then new east terminal are a 767 and 747. DC-8s and 707s may be quad-jets, but they're quite a lot skinnier and smaller than a 747. And you can generally make out at least a shadow from the intake on an L-1011. As odd as this may sound, I'm inclined to believe the two aircraft might actually both be charters. It's really hard to find good pictures that show it clearly, but I believe the final livery involved a black stripe on the wing.
This is a model, so don't take it as gospel, but it's about the best shot I can quickly find from above:
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If you look along what we would call C and D you'll see that every aircraft there has a fairly obvious stripe. The two widebodies at E have none. Different paint. Now, they could be hanging on in the previous livery. It's certainly possible. (Not everything gets repainted at the same time.) But given both the degree of paint consistency elsewhere and the fact that they were at city gates makes it at least some plausible they were both charters. Another minor interesting point: You can see a 737 pushing back from that mystery bumpout area. Those appear to have been Southwest gates in the days before they had their own building. (Along with the shack gates past the city gates.)
All that said . . . when did they actually first build the east terminal customs facility? The customs hall is entirerly within the structure that you see there in the picture. Without evidence to the contrary I'd have guessed they built it when they built that portion of the concourse. They almost have to have had one there for charters anyway, as TWA sure wasn't going to give up their gates for somebody else's international arrivals. And since C was, almost from day one, exclusively TWA . . . surely that customs hall was already there even well before that photo. The fact that TWA wanted to move in doesn't mean it was new. And it makes good sense that some of the city gates always had customs. (That's something you'd want to keep flexible no matter what.)
For consideration, here's some shots snagged from a slightly earlier aerial view on
St. Louis County's property viewer.
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In the above shot not only can you make out the L-1011 from the 767 but you can easily make out which aircraft have the new paint. This is obviously a little earlier than the shot Google is using, since there's a strong mix of old and new.
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As to the customs hall in T2, they clearly altered the rear wall at some point, but basically the space is already there. Even the windows are the same. And some of what looks to be building alterations could well just be the vagaries of stitching together two photos. You can see some fuzziness, and a portion of the window above the red box appears below the red box, showing that there is, in fact, a discontinuity just at that spot. This is an old enough photo someone might well have literally cut and pasted it together accidentally creating a jog that was never there in the interest of making it look pretty.
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This is just a curiosity, but it does show fairly clearly a couple of Southwest 737s at that odd bump Jshank is always asking about. Interestingly, if you look closely you can even tell that one is a 737-200 with the older Pratt and Whitney JT8 we all love hearing so much on Mad Dogs. Next to it is a 737-300 with the CFM56 in its hamster pouch.
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Lastly, another bit of trivia: the mobile lounge. You can see it in the Google Earth photo out in the middle of the bay. Here it's docked at C.
Anyway, long story short, I really have to wonder if customs were already there even in the late 80s. TWA may not have used it, but surely there were international charters arriving every once in a while, even then. Happy to see good documentary evidence one way or the other, but that Biz Journal article doesn't really say. It only says TWA wants to move so as to free up space in C.
Don't know who really has a shot at this (jshank!) but . . . I'm in! (The line to apply, that is.) This sounds like incredible fun! And hopefully, it will generate some excitement about our airport on other forums as well.
