I’ve been to Wichita a couple of times now to visit my cousin. I like the Midwest. It’s beautiful, and has more sky than I’m used to seeing. The gently rolling hills and lack of tall pine trees really open the land up. It has it’s own beauty, very different from the Pacific NW. Meg and I didn’t do a lot today. We just caught up, had a great dinner at the Wine Dive & Kitchen (have I mentioned the fantastic midwest beef, lol?), and just hung out.
But I did remember that I have two posts that I didn’t get done the last time I was out here in 2022. They are both worth talking about – the Kansas Aviation Museum, and the Great Plains Transportation Museum. So I’ll put them here.
Wichita, Kansas – Kansas Aviation Museum 2022
The Kansas Aviation Museum is incredible. Wichita is a flight town. Like Seattle, Boeing had a huge presence in Wichita for a long time, and Spirit Airlines has been a large employer for a long time. The museum is in the old airport control tower, and features some very old planes. The fun part of it is that you can get up close to the planes, and touch them.
My brother is currently writing a blog on Thomas Hamilton, so when I saw a Hamilton Air Cycle Machine, I had to take a picture of it. Chaz, this is for you!
Mooney also has a large presence in Wichita, and they made sure that they had a plane and advertising as well! The plane they had was the 1951 Mite M-18, known to be smallest and least expensive air plane at the time. It cost just under $2,000 in 1947. They called it the mini fighter plane, and it was a big hit with the ex-fighter pilots returned from the war.
My favorite was the ‘Laird Swallow’. If was produced between 1920-1923, and 43 were made. It was considered the first commercially produced airplane. One observer watching a test flight commented that she ‘flew like a Swallow’, hence the name. The plane at the museum is a recreation as no original copies are in existence.
I was fascinated by this particular plane. Planes of this time were made with a light cotton covered by layers of paint, known as cellulose ‘dope’. This really surprised me. I’d always thought it was heavy canvas, but I guess the fabric had to be the lighter the better! Then it was put together wire and leather straps on a wood frame. It was amazing how lightweight it was! The fabric was stitched with a zig zag stitch and trimmed with pinking shears, just like constructing clothing. That just seemed odd to me! You could make a plane on a sewing machine.
The museum also had exhibits about the restoration of aircraft. Planes from the 1940s and earlier were mostly made of wood, wire, and cloth – materials that deteriorated. At this point, restoration is more like reconstruction. The museum has lots of plans and prints in their archives that assist in this. And because Wichita is a aircraft town, there are lots of skilled volunteers who once worked for the military or an airframe company to assist in the process.
The museum was 3 floors for planes and interesting exhibits, including B-41 Stratofortress M3 .50 cal machine gun. I really enjoyed it. But the crowning exhibit was the ability to go up into the old control tower. The tower was set up exactly as it had been originally, right down to the rotary telephone still plugged in. I was terrified that it was going to ring and we’d have a voice from back in time right out of the Twilight Zone! It was really fun to look down on the old air field and see the planes they had parked there.
The museum was really fun, and I’d highly recommend it if you are ever in the area.
Great Plains Transportation Museum –2022
Driving down Douglas Street in Wichita, there is an elevated railroad crossing. The viaduct has active freight trains, and surprisingly, a museum. The greaming black steam engine is pretty hard to miss. I didn’t get nearly the amount of pictures I would have liked, but I did get some. The museum is located at 700 E Douglas Ave, and it’s a small storefront in the shadow of the viaduct. But don’t let that fool you. It houses a truly amazing number of exhibits as well as full size train cars that you can crawl all over.
The museum staff at the time we visited was incredibly knowledgeable about the history of rail travel and freight through the area, and many were retired railway workers. We were walked us through the exhibits personally. It was clearly a labor of love. The exhibits inside the museum showed the growth, history and importance of the railroad in the area.
I still can’t believe how huge the steam engine was!
The most fun was getting to explore the actual train cars, caboose, and old engines. We were walked through an engine, navigating the machinery and the small areas that the engineers had to work in. Our guide was amazing, and we had a ball. I highly recommend this museum not only for the information, but for the fun of exploring actual vintage train cars!
