Best Aviation museum

Dana said:
Old Rhinebeck will always be my favorite. You can fly in (with permission) if you're comfortable with a short rough field.
Click to expand...

+1 for Old Rhinebeck Aerodrome. The distingushing feature of ORA is that these antiques are flown every week weather permitting! Well, kinda sorta. The last time I was there the Bleriot XI's engine needed an overhaul and couldn't make enough power for flight. It fast taxied and would be in the air from bump to bump.

Here is a photo of the 3 cylinder rotary Ansani(sp?) engine. Good luck finding parts for the overhaul. I believe every part will have to be manufactured new...

upload_2019-8-8_9-46-2.png
 
Cooter said:
My best experience was in a private museum in Va Beach, where they owner kept nearly everything in flying condition and would fly the displays twice a week.
Click to expand...
Which museum was that? If it wasn't the Military Aviation Museum, you should see it: https://militaryaviationmuseum.org I was very pleased with the collection when I visited last fall and had too much to list but included a Catalina and a V-1 buzz bomb, neither of which I've seen anywhere else.

Ellsworth AFB at Rapid City, SD, has a great air museum if you like the jet age of military aviation: https://www.sdairandspacemuseum.com

Wings Over the Rockies in Denver was the venue of an event I attended last summer and I wish I had more time with just the museum. Their YouTube channel is really good, targeting a less aviation-knowledgeable audience but not dumbed down to the point of being at all annoying.

My home state, North Dakota has two air museums of note. Of the two, the one in Minot is my preference. Everything warbirds in a state of active restoration to multiple flying P-51Ds, plus a wide variety of GA planes through the ages. Fargo is also pretty cool but if you go to just one, I'd vote for Minot. But go in the summer, as the flying part of the collection spends winters in Texas.
 
I wonder if the search for "the best" doesn't rule out a whole lot of "very good" fine wine, doctors, books, and more - including aviation museums.

In July, I visited the Lyon Air Museum in Santa Ana, CA, on the GA side of John Wayne Airport. It sure isn't "the best," but I really enjoyed 90 minutes there, especially compared to waiting at Gate C18. Just one hangar, but it had a B-17, B-25, Bird Dog, A-26, two DC-3s, bunch of WWII-era military vehicles, lots of models and explanations, and a rotating Ferrari exhibit.

Not the best. Good enough.
20190730-Lyon-IMG_3189-2.jpg
 
I almost forgot to mention something in the context of aviation museum displays. If you like nose art, eat at Harry's in Minnesota: https://www.eatatharrys.com The website doesn't seem to show anything or even mention it, but there are a couple of hints like the airplane in the logo and the picture of the proprietor with an F8F. The restaurant (including the restrooms) is full of displayed airplane nose art. And the food's good, too.

Edit to add this disclaimer: I am nearly positive I have the right restaurant, but I was brought there by a pilot friend a year ago and had to retrace our car route on Google Maps and draw some inferences. If you go there and they don't have nose art on the walls, ask them where I was thinking of and post back here. :)
 
Last edited:
Ryanb said:
I need to check out the one at GKT on my next visit.

Anyone been?
Click to expand...

I just took my family on Tuesday this week. We come down here for a summer vacation annually and we had a lot of fun. It’s not huge, but I’ve got kids (6 and 8) so it was sized right. Got them T-shirt’s too in the gift shop. The P-47s they keep flyable are incredible, there are some nice older MiGs and many other nice planes and collections. One of the volunteers let me and the kids sit in an A-4 cockpit for some pictures too.

I agree Wright Patt is fantastic but for those with small kids it’s not really feasible unless the kids are diehard avgeeks already. That’s on my 5 year plan with them.
 
I'll boost the SAC museum in between Lincoln and Omaha. The cool thing about it is that since it's all about SAC, it captures a "moment" (albeit a fairly long moment) that stretches roughly from the golden age of piston aircraft to the SR-71. The big hangar is laid out almost like a tree - as you walk down the middle you can watch the evolution of strategic bombing (B-17, B-29, B-52, B-36 all in a line) with all kinds of interesting offshoots on either side like the Hustler, the Goblin, etc. There are lots of other cool aircraft around from that era as well. The SR-71 is unforgettable - they built the atrium around it. When you walk in the front door it is "diving" straight at you in a slight bank.
 
I add in the USS Intrepid in Manhattan. They have an impressive array of aviation there, including a shuttle and a Concorde (you can pay a few bucks extra to get in and have a seat), as well as all sorts of different kinds of examples of Naval aviation, as well as even an A-12.
 
Steve Costello said:
I add in the USS Intrepid in Manhattan. They have an impressive array of aviation there, including a shuttle and a Concorde (you can pay a few bucks extra to get in and have a seat), as well as all sorts of different kinds of examples of Naval aviation, as well as even an A-12.
Click to expand...

That reminds me. Add the USS Midway in San Diego to my list of good ones.
 
The Evergreen Museum is a short drive from the Vans Aircraft factory near Portland. The museum is definitely worth a visit if you're out that way. The Vans factory is worth a visit too if you're interested in experimentals at all.
 
+1 on San Diego Air and Space...looks deceptively small from the front of the building but is really big. They ave a Sea Dart and an SR71 on the Front lawn.

SDASM_Entrance_Peter%20Carney%20Header.jpg


851297.jpg
 
We were at the Naval Aviation Museum (not it's formal title) in Pensacola last week. I'll second the comment that the 4 Blue Angel A-4s hanging from the ceiling are a highlight. They have a number of aircraft on display that you just won't find anywhere else in the world. BTW, don't follow your GPS to the museum, you will be sent to the wrong gate onto the NAS. The guard will give you a map and instructions to go to the west gate. Very helpful and friendly. At least, the guard on duty when we were there was. Oh, and stop at the Pensacola lighthouse while you're there. A great view of the area from the top (assuming you can make the 177 steps to the top, I did, my wife didn't even try).

Museum of Flight at Boeing Field is great. Parking for your airplane right in front (call ahead to confirm).

The Evergreen Museum in Oregon is great. The entrance road is painted like a runway. Yes, I did center my Jeep on the painted centerline going in. :p

Thanks for the heads up on the Smithsonian in DC. I still need to get to the Udvar-Hazy annex at IAD. We'll be changing planes there next month, but won't have time to take in the museum.

There's an A-12 on display at the space museum in Huntsville, AL, along with a bunch of other great exhibits. Mainly space related (as one would expect for the home of Space Camp).

I haven't made it to the Air Force museum yet. Someday... And the EAA museum was great when we were there in 1988. I can only imagine what it is like today.

Regardless, have fun!
 
Steve Costello said:
I add in the USS Intrepid in Manhattan. They have an impressive array of aviation there, including a shuttle and a Concorde (you can pay a few bucks extra to get in and have a seat), as well as all sorts of different kinds of examples of Naval aviation, as well as even an A-12.
Click to expand...
Yeah, I guess now that they're done smashing up poor Enterprise, it's a great display.
Nobody liked my suggestion that they should have just released it from the SCA and let them land it on the carrier deck.
 
iamtheari said:
Which museum was that? If it wasn't the Military Aviation Museum, you should see it: https://militaryaviationmuseum.org I was very pleased with the collection when I visited last fall and had too much to list but included a Catalina and a V-1 buzz bomb, neither of which I've seen anywhere else.
Click to expand...
That’s it. I had a great time there and was surprised by the collection.
 
Hill AF Base has a decent museum, mostly Korean War stuff and on. Best of all it’s free! AND they have a nice 13,500’ runway to land on right on site.

Just kidding don’t do that. But KOGD is very close as well.
 
Best ones I've been to that are still open:

National Air and Space Museum (downtown), Washington, DC
EAA museum, Oshkosh, WI KOSH
Evergreen Air and Space Museum, McMinnville, OR KMMV
Lone Star Air Museum, Houston, TX KEFD

The ones that are on my aviation museum bucket list:

NASM Udvar-Hazy center, Washington, DC
National Museum of the USAF, Dayton, OH Wright-Patterson AFB
 
Zeldman said:
if you ever find yourself in the middle of nowhere....

https://www.museumofflight.us/
Click to expand...

Hey, I've been to Greybull a couple times. They used to have cheap fuel, but when I looked last week while planning my next west coast trip, not so much. Cool planes though. Lots of WWII hardware that was converted for aerial firefighting.
 
I haven't been to nearly as many as I should (or would like), but probably Air & Space at the Smithsonian is the best I've been to. And of course Pima, locally. :)

But really, best or not, just about any aviation museum anywhere is worth a visit, right? :)
 
On your way through the Pacific Northwest, stop in Nampa (just west of Boise) at The Warhawk Air Museum.
Great people, super collection of aircraft, and an amazing collection of thousands of stories of Veterans from the Spanish American war, to the present.
 
The Smithsonian's aviation museum is the best I've been to so far, and I haven't seen many others, but when I was a kid, one of the most fun places to be were the aircraft boneyards on the various Naval installations. I could sit in fighter jets and helicopters, and make airplane noises all day long.
 
Couple nice ship museums are the USS Yorktown Carrier in Charleston and the USS Alabama in Mobile. Good little selection of aircraft at the Alabama including a YF-17.
 
On the other side of the pond, Flugwerft Schleißheim, just north of Munich, is a good one. It's on a WW1-era airfield, now Germany's oldest operating airfield, next to the gaudy summer palace of the Bavarian royal family. Flugwerft is the aviation branch of the prestigious Deutsches Museum. The main campus of Deutsches Museum in Munich normally houses several historic aircraft as well, but most of those have temporarily been moved to Flugwerft during a decade-long renovation of the old museum.
 
Shopshirt said:
+1 on San Diego Air and Space...looks deceptively small from the front of the building but is really big. They ave a Sea Dart and an SR71 on the Front lawn.

SDASM_Entrance_Peter%20Carney%20Header.jpg


851297.jpg
Click to expand...


Polite note that the second picture here is actually Udvar-Hazy in DC. I see two types I've flown in the picture as well...
 
Cooter said:
My best experience was in a private museum in Va Beach, where they owner kept nearly everything in flying condition and would fly the displays twice a week.
Click to expand...

It's still open!?!? About 5 years ago the owner said that he was going to close the museum and start selling off the planes.
 
Don't know how I forgot the WasserKuppe in the Rhone region of Germany. Lots of aviation going on above. A really neat museum on the field featuring Sailplanes.
 
Crashnburn said:
Thanks for listing the Hiller Museum. Once upon a time, I was a docent there.
I drove past the Oakland Airport Museum a lot for more than a year when I worked in Alameda; have yet to visit it.
Click to expand...
Yeah, I lived in San Francisco before moving to Santa Rosa earlier this year and had a T-hangar at North Field in Oakland. The Oakland Aviation Museum on Earhart Rd. is pretty neat. They have a four engine Short Brothers Solent flying boat that was featured in Raiders of the Lost Ark that's worth a trip.
https://www.mercurynews.com/2014/12/18/indiana-jones-and-the-oakland-aviation-museum/
 
The one in Pensacola is massive and you can walk up and touch just about everything. No rope lines and lots of interactive stuff.

Plus, for a good bit of the year, the Blue Angels practice in the mornings. Watch the show, go to the museum.
 
Smithsonian was great when I visited many years ago if for no other reason than the famous items they had (Apollo 11 capsule, Spirit of St. Louis, etc.) Wright Patterson AF museum may be my favorite just because of the sheer number of planes. Pensacola is right up there with WP just because of the quality of the exhibits. Warner Robbins AFB in GA is a nice little museum if your are in the area. Don't miss the Air Force Armaments Museum at Eglin AFB if you are going to be in the Pensacola area. It was very interesting.
 
We were very pleasantly surprised in Granite Falls, MN today (KGDB). Stopped for fuel en route from Seattle to Wisconsin, knew nothing of the Fagen Fighters WWII Museum on the field... But the main hangar was open and the PT-19 went out for a spin, so we walked over when they came back.

It's a small town, not particularly close to anything, but this museum is GREAT! We'll definitely make a return trip when we're not trying to cover so many miles in a day.

They have over a dozen planes, and all but three are in flying condition - And two of those three are gliders, and the third is German. They even have a flyable Jenny.

The planes are also beautifully restored, and spotless. They look like they could have rolled out of the factory this morning.

There are some really unique things in their collection like a Waco CG-4A transport glider, a working Link trainer complete with the "plotter table" and the motor and bellows that ran it, and a bunch of other well-restored stuff.

I didn't look in the Bomber Hangar or the Fighter Hangar, but one of the things I'm really interested in going back to see is their WWII control tower, complete with WWII radios. And yes, the tower looked brand new too. I've never seen one like that.

Anyway, I highly recommend it if you're in the area... Or anywhere near the area, since I'm guessing not a lot of people randomly end up in Granite Falls.
 
I’m kind of partial to the Cradle of Aviation museum in Long Island. I volunteer 2-4 times a month at this one depending on my work schedule. It’s a great, local museum highlighting aviation on Long Island. I volunteer in the Jet Gallery which has an A-10, A-6, F-14 and an actual cockpit of a B-707 (donated by El Al) on display.

https://www.cradleofaviation.org/
 
One that I've only seen from the outside is the American Helicopter Museum, in West Chester, PA. http://americanhelicopter.museum/
You can fly there, it's on KOQN (Brandywine).

VWR Scientific had offices overlooking KOQN, before they got bought out by Avantor. Lots of meetings there where the monotony was broken by watching the aircraft- someone had an autogyro there that would fly around the pattern.
 
Pima is amazing. Plus Tucson in general is an aviation dream. Lots of mil, civi and LEO birds all over the place. A-10s to F-16s, boneyards, special ops birds, airliners. I love getting out there as much as possible. Ottawa is also quite good(I know, not in the U.S.). Rare birds like a Mosquito, fokker WW1 plane(I think).



O
 
The Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam has one airplane in it on the third floor. Does that count?

D6EB85E7-878C-415C-8FA9-18A0D748FC16.jpeg
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top