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| Another museum burns: Ypsilanti air museum https://www.rypn.org/forums/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=11107 |
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| Author: | Aarne H. Frobom [ Mon Oct 11, 2004 10:06 am ] |
| Post subject: | Another museum burns: Ypsilanti air museum |
Today's Detroit Free Press contains a story about the destruction by fire of the Yankee Air Museum at Willow Run Airport at Ypsilanti, Michigan. A World War II temporary wooden hangar was entirely destroyed, along with several aircraft and a collection of artifacts. A flyable B-25D was being pushed into the building when the fire was discovered, and was pushed back out again. A flyable C-47 was pushed out by hand, and a flyable B-17G was towed out. The newspaper doesn't list what aircraft were destroyed, but from visits I can recall several 1950's and 1960's jet fighters, including a F-105, part of a wooden transport glider, some 1930's light planes, and neatest of all, a folding tiny 2-cylinder scout airplane designed to be operated by the French Resistance from roads, and then folded up and hidden. Aircraft displayed outside were unaffected by the fire, including a PB4-Y Privateer (single tail), which was as close as the museum could come to getting one of the Liberators built at the Willow Run Ford plant across the airfield. The building housed a small collection of WWII aviation memorabilia in a warren of offices, including some materials relating to the Willow Run plant. I don't know if any original research materials were lost. Newspaper articles from last year had reported the fire risk associated with this building. A fund-raising program for a new building has been under way for some time, with some of Detroit's leading industrialists on the board. Last year this building was the site of one of neatest old-technology events I ever saw, the recreation of the 1920's National Air Tours promoted by Edsel Ford. Around 30 1920's civil aircraft, including a couple survivors of the original tour, toured the country beginning and ending at Ypsilanti. This included Amercian and British-empire mail planes, light planes, and three different makes of tri-motors. This was the aviation equivalent of seeing a PRR K4, a B&O President class, and a NYC Hudson lined up in 2004. But this remarkable event drew only a couple hundred people to the airfield, which told me that railroad museums aren't the only institutions that struggle to get the word out in a way that makes people respond. Visitors could walk right up to and peer into these airplanes. After reading the 2003 newspaper article, it was a trifle scary to see all that equipment rolled into the wood hangar. One last detail: the mounts for the B-17's waist guns carry the maker's nameplate: "The Lionel Corp." |
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