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David G. Neeleman, who has owned a home in New Cannan, turns 54 on Wednesday. He was born Oct. 16, 1959, in São Paulo, Brazil.
He has founded three commercial airlines, Morris Air, JetBlue Airways and Azul Brazilian Airlines.
He co-founded Morris Air, a low-fare charter airline and later he assumed the helm of Morris Air as its president in 1988. After leaving Morris Air, he became the CEO of Open Skies and also helped with another upstart airline, WestJet.
As the CEO of JetBlue Airways, he donated his entire salary to the JetBlue Crewmember Crisis Fund, which was established for JetBlue employees who had fallen on hard times.
On March 27, 2008 he announced plans to launch a new airline, Azul , a domestic carrier in Brazil . He is the recipient of the Tony Jannus Award for outstanding leadership in the commercial aviation industry in 2005.
He also served a mission for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in the Northeast Region, Brazil.
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