2020-04-10 Aggregate Review of Several Aviation Museums Over the period of about a year, I was able to visit four different air and space museums in the (relatively) nearby area. I meant to phlog about these quite a while ago, but sometimes phlogspiration comes erratically. The museums were: The National Air and Space Museum [1], in Washington, DC The Steven F Udvar-Hazy Center [2], in Chantilly, VA The Military Aviation Museum [3], near Virginia Beach, VA and The College Park Aviation Museum [4], in College Park, MD I wouldn't consider myself an aviation buff, but these museums surprised me as some of the most interesting museums I have visited in a long time. Maybe that was due to the fact that I normally stick to art and science museums, but I think it is also due to the fact that these museums combine tangible links to important events in modern history with an up close window into some amazing feats of engineering. Even the smallest of these museums, the College Park Aviation Museum, was well worth the visit (if you're nearby). The most famous of these museums were the National Air and Space Museum in Washington DC, and the Udvar-Hazy Center. These are part of the Smithsonian Institution and have absolutely enormous collections [5]. The DC museum is huge and has more exhibits than you can possibly appreciate in one day. Luckily, it is a free museum and you can visit as often as you like whenever you have a chance, if you're in the local area. It has artifacts from all periods of flight, from the earliest modern attempts at flight, through modern space flight (e.g. satellites). The museum includes many full aircraft (like a Douglas DC-3 and a Lockheed U-2), as well as partial aircraft (like a Boeing 747 fuselage), all interspersed with other artifacts and explanatory signs that walk you through the "story of flight". The DC museum is big, but the Udvar-Hazy Center in VA is enormous. It is composed primarily of two giant hangars housing planes on top of planes on top of planes (and helicopters, dirigibles, satellites, spacecraft, missiles, and other flying things). I think the biggest plane on exhibit is a full Aérospatiale/BAC Concorde passenger jet. The building is also home to possibly the most well-known and notorious plane in history: the Boeing B-29 Superfortress "Enola Gay". Space Shuttle Discovery lives there too. But one of my favorite aspects of the Udvar-Hazy was coverage of the more smallscale or even pedestrian attempts at flying. There are exhibits on tiny single-person planes (look up the "Stits SA-2A Sky Baby" to see the "cutest" plane ever flown), gyrocopters, and even the capsule (or a replica?) from which Felix Baumgartner's made his record-setting "jump from space". But as pedestrian as it was, by far my favorite single "little exhibit" in this museum was a "toy" helicopter-type contraption that was designed to get lift by being pulled behind a car so that children could experience flight. What could possibly go wrong?(TM). Much further south, was the Military Aviation Museum. This was an almost random stop on a few-day trip to Virginia Beach. I didn't know a thing about it and didn't really have high expectations. But I was absolutely blown away. This is a museum you *have* to visit if you have even the slightest interest in aviation. The museum site contains multiple hangars that are filled with primarily WWI and WWII aircraft. But not just "planes on display"; pretty much all planes in the museum are in working condition, and the museum has its own on site airstrip from which the planes regularly fly. Oil is dripping from the engines as flight mechanics tune them up and/or restore them and mechanic / aviation-buff / docents wander around answering any question you can possibly ask. The Military Aviation Museum runs multiple airshows per year (I wasn't there in time to see one), including an annual WWI show and a WWII show. The planes represent many of the different countries in the world wars, so you'll see U.S. (of course), German, Japanese, British, and many other countries. This museum has a $15-ish entrance fee but is 100% worth the trip. And finally, back up north, was the College Park Aviation Museum, near the small College Park Airport. The airport is the world's oldest continually operating airport, and was first developed as a military demonstration site for the Wright Brothers. The link to the Wright Brothers is the main attraction at this museum and many of the exhibits revolve around them or around the subsequent history of the airport. In addition to its link to the famous brothers, the airport was home to many other "firsts" such as the first controlled helicopter flight, the first Army Aviation School, and some of the first high-altitude military aviation flights. While this museum is small compared with the other three mentioned above, it is well worth the visit because of the historical significance of the site itself (the exhibits are good too). There. Finally got this gopher post out the door. These were all great museums and I recommend each one of them if you have even the slightest interest in aviation. I am under covid-10 lockdown in the house now, so there will probably be no new opportunities for museum reviews any time soon. -- [1] https://airandspace.si.edu/node/73198/ [2] https://airandspace.si.edu/udvar-hazy-center [3] https://militaryaviationmuseum.org/ [4] http://collegeparkaviationmuseum.com/1593/College-Park-Aviation-Museum [5] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_aircraft_in_the_Smithsonian_Institution