Warbird Information Exchange

They were considered disposable aircraft.

Gliders, made of steel frames and sheathed in thin plywood, carried U.S. and British troops and their heavy artillery and supplies silently behind enemy lines before crash-landing.

The aircraft were so perilous they garnered the nickname "flying coffins."

On Wednesday, June 6, a CG-4A glider made from restored and fabricated parts was shown off at an open house at Eagan-based Villaume Industries, marking the end of a four-year effort led by several local retirees.

On Thursday, the glider will be loaded onto a flatbed truck and driven to its new home at the Fagen Fighters World War II Museum in Granite Falls, Minn.

"I hate to see it go, because it's been a labor of love," said project volunteer Jim Johns, adding that the aircraft is one of just 11 CG-4A gliders in the world.

During the war, Villaume Industries, then located in St. Paul, produced the custom precision wooden wings, control surfaces and floors for 1,509 of the nearly 14,000 gliders manufactured in the U.S. It served as a subcontractor for St. Paul-based Northwestern Aeronautical Corp., which became the second-largest manufacturer of gliders, behind Ford Motor Co.

In 2007, Johns and fellow restorer Ingemar Holm approached the company to gauge its interest in helping build a CG-4A glider from the ground up.

"They asked me if we had any plans and if we had any parts," recalled company president Nick Linsmayer, whose great-grandfather Eugene started Villaume Box & Lumber Co. in 1882 on St. Paul's West Side. "I said, 'Well, no ... we moved from St. Paul to Eagan 40 years ago. ' "
But Linsmayer did offer space in a company warehouse for volunteers to work on the project, which started in March 2008.

"A year turned to two years and so on," said Johns, a retired Army aviation captain from Bloomington. "Then (Linsmayer) started to see us bringing in parts and it taking shape. In the end, he said, 'You guys got a home here.' "

The glider has 72,000 parts, more than half of them wood. And because the planes never made it back from battle, parts were hard to find.

Volunteers collected some vintage parts from training planes that the National World War II Glider Pilots Association had salvaged for its museum in Lubbock, Texas. They found original instrument panels, infantry seats and landing gear.

"One of the tires still has the World War II air in it," Johns said.

They also found a long, narrow case that stored "barf bags" for the troops who succumbed to the plane's bumpy ride.

"Before the bags, the pilots told them to barf in their helmets," Johns said.

Volunteers raised much of the estimated $14,000 it cost to pay for parts and supplies. It took more

Ray Nagell, 90, of Bloomington, an infantryman during World War II recalls flying a glider in Holland in September of 1944 during the open house at Villaume Industries on Wednesday, June 6, 2012 in Eagan. German soldiers fired on planes as they landed in a potato field, Nagell recalled. After a four-year restoration by a group of volunteers, a World War II glider plane is being moved to a museum in Granite Falls, MN. (Pioneer Press: Ginger Pinson) than 30,000 hours to complete the project.
The work was slow and detailed, Johns said.

Master woodworker and glider pilot Dale Johnson created many of the parts. Joe Messacar, a former aeronautical engineer, was adept at reading the old, faded blueprints and making sure the parts were to exact specification.

"I'd like to see this stay around here locally, but we really have nowhere to put it," said Johnson, who was on hand for Wednesday's open house.

Ray Nagell, 90, of Bloomington also stopped by to see the finished product. An infantryman during WWII, Nagell recalled flying into Holland in a glider in September 1944. German soldiers fired on the planes as they landed in a potato field.

"I remember the noise," he said. "We were going in at 125 mph, and the cloth sides were flapping so loud."