U.S. Air Force Museum offers a look back at flight

As an air-struck kid this writer used to drag his mother to air shows around Dayton, Ohio, every summer. It must of had some affect because he went into the Air Force later in life. Dayton, of course, was where the Wright brothers had their bike shop and built the first heavier-than-air airplane. So air shows were a staple in Ohio.

Now they've got a kid's dream of an air show just outside Dayton, Ohio, next to the sprawling Wright-Patterson Air Force Base. It's the U.S. Air Force Museum, the biggest -17 acres - and best of its kind in the world. There's even an IMax theater, where they are showing "Fighter Pilot," a dazzling exhibition of modern air war. Keep your seat belts fastened! And the museum is free. All you have to do is get there.

The museum looks back worldwide at military air history from pre-World War I days with more than 300 real, flown aircraft, ranging from World War I Fokker biplanes to Japanese Zeros from World War II, to personal presidential planes to experimental types that flew but never went into production.

The galleries condense historic era into five hangars, starting with the Early Years. This offers examples of the first military machines, their weapons, their engines. The famous SPAD VII, which Capt. Eddie Rickenbacker flew to become America's leading ace, is there. So are the Neuport and the German tri-wing. This hanger goes up to World War II.

The Air Power gallery is packed with aircraft from that era, including the Mustang P-51, the Thunderbold P-47 and the forerunner of most modern bombers, the B-17 and B-29. That's where you'll find the Japanese Zero and Messerschmitt 109. The Lightning P-38 is poised there, looking like it's ready to launch itself at a foe.

The Modern Flight Hangar features an immense B-52 suspended from the roof. It is surrounded by more exotic examples of edge-of-space flight, including the X-1 and X-2.

In the Space Gallery space suits and all the things that go with searching the skies is on display. The Cold War Gallery includes aircraft such as the Soviet MIG-17 and MIG-17 and the American Saber Jet F-86.

The Presidential Aircraft and Research and Developmental Research and Development/Flight Test Museum is actually on the air base. One takes a bus to get there, after having been vetted by museum staffers. There things really get weird, with such as two Mustang fighters linked into one aircraft, or a combo prop-jet fighter. All of these were used in the development of production aircraft. There are also the presidential transport aircraft, ranging from Harry Truman's to John F. Kennedy's.

The museum's Education Division offers programs for youth and schoolchildren and there's a combination gift shop-bookstore-model shop-poster store that sells a wide variety of merchandise having to do with the museum and military aircraft.

The museum is surrounded on one side by a park with the memorials to American flight units. Picnic tables make a nice place to take a break the gallery-going. You'll never see it all in just a morning or afternoon. On the other side is a air park of planes too big or not novel enough for inside the museum. There's also an indoor snack shop on the second floor of the main museum entrance area.

This is a museum that can set young hearts dreaming of adventures into the far reaches of space. I can also send older minds back to fantasies of swirling dogfights between Saber Jet and MIG-15s. And it's free.

Contact reporter Sam Bauman at sbauman@nevadaappeal.com or 881-1236.