|
| There are quite a few museums and I've been concentrating on points west.
The museum of Flight at Seattle is very good.
SAC museum is very good.
The Combat Air museum at Topeka's Forbe's Field is good.
The Evergreen museums at McMinnville OR includes the Spruce Goose, rockets and a water park topped by a retired 747. One of 5 museums in the Portland OR vicinity. Evergreen is the biggest, Tillamook in a dirigible hangar is good, Hood River OR is good, less military than most, Peterson at Vancouver WA is older vintage and smaller, Hillboro had only two aircraft and one of them in pieces, a MIG17A and a F104G. I went west in May for those museums.
Directories list at least 5 air museums in the Minneapolis area, I found only two open this May. The Commemorative AF arm was small but busy as they fly their aircraft and were in the process of replacing an engine. Another at Anoka-Blaine airport wasn't open but I had arranged a visit by e-mail ahead of time and found the place buzzing (mostly non-military and 5 brands of trimotors) as they polished it up for a dance. The MN air guard museum is probably the best, but its closed because of a visitor safety issue and they have no funds to fix whatever that it. Others have run out of money and have folded.
There is on line listing for a museum at Wichita. I found it mostly models and the few full sized aircraft on the ramp stripped and rejects from the scrap yard. The engines on stands inside were packed so tight most couldn't be seen.
Museum of Flight and Evergreen took me a day each. SAC more than half a day, Combat Air several hours, like Tillamook and Anoka-Blaine. Some took longer to find than to do a white glove inspection on each of the aircraft present.
Also in Kansas, at Hutchinson is the Cosmosphere, mostly space craft with a Blackbird in the lobby. Much WW2 German rocketry as well as more recent space programs including a Mercury capsule that spent decades at the bottom of the Pacific. Took half a day ignoring the movies and other organized programs.
Gerald J. | |
|
Air museums
