About
Not long after graduating from Oregon’s Willamette University in 1955 with a degree in economics and engineering, Elling Halvorson founded a company that specialized in construction projects in difficult locations. That led to him building a freshwater pipeline from the North to the South Rim of the Grand Canyon in the early 1960s, using helicopters to lower supplies to the Canyon floor. Realizing the bigger opportunity, he began selling Canyon air tours in 1965 and eventually became chairman of Papillon Airways Inc., the world’s largest air-tour provider. He also built up more than a dozen other family-owned businesses.
Elling and his wife, Barbara, raised four sons and a daughter and were active philanthropists. He continued to keep a hand in running the Papillon Group—the largest air-tour provider—along with his family-owned businesses, until his death in 2020 at age 88. He is deeply missed.
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