Doris C. Halaby dead; mother of Queen Noor of Jordan was 97

Doris C. Halaby, whose husband was the administrator of what is now the Federal Aviation Administration under Presidents John F. Kennedy and Lyndon B. Johnson, and whose daughter became the queen of Jordan, died Dec. 25 at another daughter’s home in Washington. She was 97.

The cause was pneumonia, said Queen Noor.

Halaby lived with her family in Washington from 1945 to 1954 and again from 1960 to 1965, when her husband, Najeeb E. Halaby, was FAA administrator. After many years in New York City, Halaby returned to the District of Columbia in 2009.

Doris Carlquist was born Sept. 9, 1918, in Leavenworth, Washington, where her father was mayor. As a child, she moved with her family to Anchorage, decades before Alaska became a state.

She completed high school in Spokane, Washington, where she was a champion tennis player. She was a political science graduate of the University of Washington. In 1945, she married Halaby, who was then a Navy test pilot who made the country’s first nonstop transcontinental flight in a jet aircraft. The family settled in Washington, where Halaby reared three children. Her husband later became chairman of Pan American World Airways.

After their divorce in 1977, Halaby did not remarry. Her daughter Lisa Halaby married Jordan’s King Hussein in 1978 and became known as Queen Noor. The king died in 1999.

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Halaby, who was a frequent guest at White House state dinners attended by her daughter, served on the boards of several companies and nonprofit agencies, including American Near East Refugee Aid, which provides humanitarian assistance to Palestinian refugees; American-Mideast Educational and Training Services, which supports educational efforts in the Middle East; and the Foreign Policy Association.

In addition to Queen Noor, survivors include two children, Christian Halaby, of Redwood City, California, and Alexa Halaby, of Washington; 10 grandchildren; and eight great-grandchildren.