Air Force Museum - Dayton, Ohio

August 28
Friday

Driving from Columbus to Dayton thru the Midwest I finally realized what I had been missing seeing --those Burma Shave signs that were posted on the fence posts in the midwest in the 50s!  As a kid I kept a notebook and had dozens of the corny/clever poems saved. Here's one of my favs from my memory:
                    His cheek was rough
                     His chick vamoosed
                    And now she won't
                    Come home to roost.

Arrived at cousin Gary's place and sat in his backyard visiting and watching all the birds that come to his feeders --  hummers, cardinals, finches, woodpeckers in an old tree in back.  It really is a little paradise. He raises tomatoes but starts them early and they are about gone now. A few years ago he developed the Platfoot tomato which was sold in tomato cataloges, but "just putters now".

 We planned to tour the Air Force Museum at Wright Patterson Air Force Base in Dayton. Gary asked if I wanted to go in the Mazda or the Corvette?  Is he kidding, the Corvette of course.

   

The museum is huge with 6 different sections to see, all crammed with planes and related info.

Gary was a good guide having retired from GM and worked at the base as a tool designer.

There are several different areas to tour in this huge building - Early Aircraft, WWII, South East Asian War, Korean War, and the Space Race.

Even a section of Bob Hope touring to entertain the troops.

We started in the Early Years Gallery with the Wright Brothers history in Dayton.

 Some of the jackets worn by the WWII fighter pilots.

Into the Space Race, Sputnik was there, but only a replica.

 More menacing forms of aircraft showed up as we went further into the Space Race exhibit.

 These are only a  few of the hundreds on display in each area.

This is the capsule carrying the astronauts that splashes into the ocean upon returning to earth.

Once again, the Air Force Museum wasn't on my list but this trip is about new discoveries and this one turned out to be very interesting. I only wish I had taken notes to i.d. each aircraft for this blog. You will have to go see for yourself, it's definitely worth a trip.

On the way home on the freeway I noticed the odometer on Gary's Vette had 200 mph listed. He said he thought it would only do about 180.  Just then he punched it and sent me back into my seat. WOW!  What was that?!  He said that was 100 mph in about the equivalent of 3 city blocks.

The fastest I've ever gone on land!