A very nice Air Force Museum...

While we were in Georgia I had the opportunity to visit the Warner Robins Air Force Museum located just of the edge of the base.  They have a substantial outdoors display of planes and helicopters, ranging from the B-1 bomber to the B-57 "Buff" to several big transport planes, and an A-10 (one of my heroes).

Since the weather is pretty nice most of the year down there, the planes didn't show much in the way of deterioration or decay.  Most of them have been there for a bunch of years.  They also have indoor displays of planes, and exhibits spread throughout four huge hangers.

I stopped in the Vietnam era hanger first.  I recognized all of the things in there, and used or rode in most of them at some point in my career.  They had several old 1/4-ton "Jeeps" there.  I sure wish I had a nickel for every time I was in one of them...I certainly would be very wealthy by now.

While I was in the main hanger area looking at the Korean War exhibit, I walked around the corner and got hit in the face with the smell of a canvas tent -- a GP-Medium, which was part of the display.  As I have said many, many times before, once you know the smell of canvas tents, you never forget it. It really shoots a whole raft of memories your way all at once.

There were two hangers pretty much devoted to the equipment, stories and displays of WWII.  I could have spent the whole day in there, but I ran out of time.  This is a lot like the Museum at Wright Patterson in that it takes more than a couple of days to see everything if you want to read things and really look at them.  So here are some of the items I picked out for this article.

I was also particularly impressed by their display of C-147s and C-17s and how they had them set up to depict the Airborne assault at Normandy on D-Day. There was a mock-up of one of the planes and they had paratroopers lined up ready to jump.  There were recordings of voices, engines, gunfire and flack guns playing as you stood there looking at them, all of which added a great deal to the display.  You then saw one paratrooper jumping out of a plane, and with a little help from your imagination, you saw him jumping over a town and a rural French chapel.

In the books and movies of that day you always see white stripes painted around the wings and body of the airplane.  These were called "Invasion Stripes."  Before the invasion, General Eisenhower said, "If you see planes overhead, they will be ours."  But just to make sure Allied aircraft were easy to identify, these "Invasion Stripes" were painted on each plane involved in the invasion.  Typically these planes were Martin B-26Gs and C-47 "Skytrains."  Over 800 C-47s were used in the invasion to carry over 13,000 American paratroopers into

combat.  One other thing about these invasion planes, like many of their fellow planes, they all bore some sort of "nose art."  The pilot of the airplane usually picked out the particular piece of art for his plane and it usually related to a wife or girlfriend.  Although it could just reflect a whimsical mood of the whole crew.

I also liked the different displays they had up to show various uniforms, what the different kinds of soldiers would wear on certain missions. I particularly liked that there was so much documentation.

 As you can tell, I really got into this place.  But aside from all of the artifacts, sights and smells, there were two things that stood out.  One -- as I was walking by a display of a B-29 bomber, two guys who had been working on it walked over by me.  I had my Ohio University coat on and one of the guys said he was from Ohio and asked me what part I lived in.  I told him it was a little town named Anna, out in the middle of a bunch of corn fields.  Strangely enough, he said he was from Troy (my old home town).  He said he retired from the Air Force and then worked at Friendly's driving truck.  I told him my son used to work there too in the summers.  Small world.

And secondly, I took particular notice of young children walking around the museum with their grandfathers who were telling them about the various planes, or how they were involved in some part of a war.  They would talk to them and point out places on a map, or show them a particular plane and tell how things were back then.  It was so cool watching the kids (most of them anyhow) soaking it up.  What a treat for the grandfathers to be able to pass on this valuable piece of their family history.  The kids don't know (and might not realize or appreciate) the importance of moments like these.  Not every child is so fortunate.

I'm not really sure why I like going to military museums so much.  Maybe the two items above have something to do with it.   But more than that, I think I understand what these brave warriors went through for me/us.  But I need reminders every once in a while, moments that recharge my desire to be a reflector of their stories...times that renew my sense of their history and my need to tell people about them, their sacrifices, and to honor their memories.

If you don't know history, it is as if you were born yesterday. And if you were born yesterday, any fool up there in a position of power can tell you anything. You have no way of checking up on it and no way of knowing if it is the truth.

  

 Hooah