Wichita, Kansas is the Air Capital of the World. The claim seemed spurious until we visited the Kansas Aviation Museum. Tens of thousands of aircraft have been manufactured here; hundreds have been designed here. We picked up a map of current and historic factories, but did not do that tour. (Although our aeronautical engineer grandson showed us a few.)
I was surprised to learn that the Waco CG-4A glider was made here (and in Kansas City). The Waco was my dad’s transportation on D-Day. We learned last year that the glider was shipped to Europe as a kit (In the Army Now, Part 2).
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- The museum is housed in the old Wichita Airport terminal.
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- Art Deco terminal interior.
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- Photo of WW2 assembly work.
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- Lots of WW2 bombers were made here.
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- Inquiring engineers like to see how things work – like by hand cranking landing gear open.
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- Inquiring engineers are also fascinated by test models like this one for radar footprint.
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- This engine for a Beech drone was made by McCulloch (the chain saw manufacturers) from 1955 to 1972.
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- This drone from Boeing never made it past the prototype stage in the 1980s (shown with wing folded).
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- Link trainer made using organ bellows to control pitch, roll, and yaw. 10,000 were made during WW2; over 500,000 pilots were trained on them.
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- In 1947, returning WW2 pilots could pick up this plane for $1995. Many did.
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- Famed travel blogger photographing a photograph accompanied by aeronautical engineer.
