A few weeks ago, I was in an email conversation with the curator of a large naval museum regarding the history of an organization his ship is part of about the history of said organization. The discussion turned to how, unfortunately, no one thinks to write a history of such institutions until everyone in them has passed on. It's a subject I understand well, having tried to cover it somewhat with the
list of notable warbird people thread (or the
defunct Commemorative Air Force units thread or the
closed/renamed aviation museums thread) and the
aviation museum Wikipedia articles I've written. However, even more recently, the subject was brought to the fore by both the
Aero Publishers Wikipedia article I wrote and
Matt Gunsch's response about FAST in the warbird regulations thread. Specifically, the latter made me realize how much knowledge about the historiography of warbirds there is on this forum. So, what I am going to suggest is that for fun, posterity or otherwise,
some WIXers try writing a history of one of these institutions that they know well.For example, lets consider a few areas:
- Organizations - Any of the groups that make up FAST: NATA, Red Star Pilots, etc. Or the National Warbird Operators Conference. Not to mention the various aviation museum professional conference groups like Mutual Concerns of Air and Space Museums, the abortive Aviation Heritage Group/International Alliance of Aviation and Space Museums and the International Aviation Group of the International Association of Transportation Museums. There's also the failed multiple-location warbird organizations. As an example of an effort, Scott Thompson has done an excellent job listing the surplus warplane transfers to schools that eventually led to the loan program of the Air Force Heritage and Museums Program of today.
- Publications - The impact Squadron/Signal has had is clearly immense. Their "Walk Around" books are a clear presence at every aviation museum and model show around. The same goes for Detail & Scale. On the the operational side of things, everyone in aviation knows Trade-a-Plane as the go-to publication to buy an airplane. However, how many people know the story of how these institutions of aviation became institutions? I doubt most do. I certainly don't. How about the aviation history magazines such as Aeroplane or Warbird Digest?
- Parts Suppliers - Univair? Aircraft Spruce? Wag Aero? The role each of them played in general aviation was critical, but how much do you know about how they developed over the years?
- Websites - The online, Craigslist-format-mirroring counterpart of Trade-a-Plane, Barnstormers. Or the legendary Joe Baugher and his serial number lists. Or the Web 1.0 style sites that are or were so lovingly maintained by a single individual: Abandoned & Little-Known Airfields, Aerofiles, Connie Survivors, Goleta Air and Space Museum, Old Wings and Ruud Leeuw's site just to name a few. Geoff Goodall's site is a rare example that has something in this regard in the form of an obituary by James Kightly on Vintage Aviation News. And then there's the forums: Airliners.net, FlyPast, Wings Over New Zealand, PPRune and, of course, WIX. (nudge, nudge Scott) So many people like to write off the importance of message boards as the ramblings of armchair commenters, but their influence on public perceptions and the spread of news is significant.
It's easy to lose such important history when the people who lived it don't realize its significance and it takes a later generation to recognize what was lost. Sometimes, as is the case with the
Link trainer and the
Norden bombsight, its only with deep research into the subject that the
vast context that set the stage for the few remaining well-known examples. So throw out some background on what you know.