The original Frontier Airlines. Frontier Airlines was an American airline formed by a merger of Arizona Airways, Challenger Airlines, and Monarch Airlines on June 1, 1950. Headquartered at the now-closed Stapleton Airport in Denver, Colorado, the airline ceased operations on August 24, 1986. A new airline was founded eight years later in 1994 using the same name. From Wikipedia. From Wikipedia: Frontier was merged with Peoples Express owned by Texas Air Corp. This was ran by the jerk Frank Lorenzo. Lorenzo single handily destroyed Eastern, New York Air, Peoples Express, the original Frontier, and Rocky Mountain Airways. Lorenzo also helped with the demise of TWA, TWA was bought by American Airlines. Thousands of people lost their jobs, Lorenzo laughed all the way to the bank. The Denver are was hit hard the same time thousands lost jobs in the Oil Bust.