I barely do, roughly 1987 and it was awful. I bet if I could find those clothes I was wearing, they’d still reek of smoke. I think there were times almost every single person except teenage me had a lit cigarette and it was 3 across seating.
And, the world didn’t come to an end after it was banned. People are definitely jerks on planes but I’d bet alcohol is often more to blame than a nicotine craving
The caption to the picture below: If you look at pictures of airliners taken prior to 1990, you might see brown stains around the outflow valve [the cabin air exhaust, replaced by fresh pressurized air from the engine bleed air]. The stains are from tobacco smoke . Airlines were thrilled when the industry banned smoking. Tar and nicotine gummed up valves, instruments, and sensors causing thousands of dollars a year in damage. Tobacco is really nasty stuff.
I flew Air Cubana from London Heathrow to Havana in 2000, and it had a smoking section at the back. 2000!
It wasn’t all that long ago that bars all had ashtrays. A bartender told me the PA Liquor Control Board rules specified how many butts could be in an ashtray without the bartender being cited.
When my kids were little and the restaurant hostess asked “smoking or nonsmoking?” I always looked at my daughter for her input. She, the quick thinking nine year old, always had a witty reply.
Late 90s (Can’t remember the exact year - that was in another ‘life’). Turned up at Gatwick with the family for a holiday flight to Puerto Vallarta. 14 hours total including a technical stop at Orlando/Sandfort for maybe 90 minutes
Big hand-written sign over the check-in desk (another nearly lost relic) saying " …flights after November 1st were all NON_SMOKING!". This was late October returning 10 days later so the outbound flight was smoking, the return was not…
I didn’t/don’t have a problem if unable to smoke but herself was a different matter altogether and that sign was a bit of a surprise.
It was not a good holiday…
In 1988, I flew non-stop from LAX to Sydney, something like 16 hours. The first X rows were non-smoking. I was in row X–the row behind me was all smokers.
I took a few flights in the 1980s, when smoking sections were definitely a thing.
For that matter, the company where I work allowed smoking inside until 1993 or so. In some offices, there seemed to be a constant low-hanging cloud.
Of course I remember that. I have often smoked on planes in my misspent youth. Cigarettes were also cheaper in the duty free shops in the airport. You could also smoke in the taxi to and from the airport, in the lounge, and in the bars before and after security, which was also lax.
Ahh! The good old days. You could smoke at the movies and in hospitals too.
I remember those sections well. I remember being stuck one or two rows away from the smoking section, which was just the same as being in the damn thing.
I even remember when the whole damn planes were smoking sections.
I remember watching my attending Pulmonologist smoke at the nurses station as we made rounds, during my residency.
The world has become better, in that regard.
Yes, and smoking sections in restaurants. Absolutely horrible.
We moved from California to Connecticut in 1999 and I’d forgotten how awful smoking sections in restaurants were. Thank goodness Connecticut banned smoking in restaurants soon after.
Back in the day I’d take my kids for dinner to the Yakety-Yak Diner, one of those old diner cars.
It was kinda cool, but oh, the smoke! Everyone smoked in there, even the waitresses, who would bring the food to your table with a cigarette in the corner of their mouth. We eventually stopped going there.
If you guys didn’t like the smoke you could have just stayed home instead of going to restaurants, bars, movie theaters, airplanes, or the hospital.
. . . .or the park, a baseball game, the mall, etc.
Thanks, forgot about those. Barber shops too, I’m sure many more places.
Doesn’t this question simply boil down to “how old are you?”. 
I too am old enough to remember when one could smoke virtually anywhere and did so for many years. I quit smoking cigarettes several years ago but if there was ever a time / place that would make me want to take it up again, it’s on a flight. It was as recently as five years ago that I discreetly took a few puffs on a dispoable e-cig on a plane, though I don’t think one could get away with that anymore.
I remember growing up in a house with parents that smoked 2 packs a day, each. Never noticed that I and all of our possessions smelled like cigarette smoke until I went away to college in the early 80’s. My dorm was a non-smoking dorm. Came home after about 2 months for a visit, walked into the house and thought I’d walked into a bar. Talked to my brother, who was also home from college, and we both offered our parents $200 if they would quit smoking for 3 months. Mom lasted about 2 weeks, but that is when my dad quit for good.
Definitely does.
I really needed to smoke on a flight out of sheer boredom. I don’t how many times I forgot to overpay for a lousy potboiler novel at the airport store so I’d have some way of passing the time.
I only had one parent smoking when I was growing up - mom quit for good when she was pregnant with my little sister. I never thought about it then but I’m sure I reeked from second-hand smoke most of the time. Twenty years after dad died, mom swore she could still smell smoke in the house.
Many years ago, but after all airlines had banned smoking on planes, I was on a flight from Russia to Turkey. The flight was full of mostly Russian’s on their way for holiday/vacation and the crew was entirely Russian. There was no smoking on the flight allowed. But there was always a group of Russian’s standing in the back of the plane by the lavatories smoking. A flight attendant would come up periodically, inform them they cannot smoke on the plane. The smokers would nod and “Da, da, da…” the flight attendant and then just return to smoking their cigarettes.