Grissom Air Reserve Base

[PJ]

Flew with IndyJen in her Grumman to see airplanes other than a Harpoon yesterday. Grissom is a huge base that was Bunker Hill Naval Air Station during World War Two and trained , among others, my Uncle Bob as a Motor Machinist Mate, and Ted Williams as a Marine Aviator. My 1948 Willys Jeep was a Bunker Hill Jeep in the 1950's. The base was renamed in 1968 after the capsule fire that killed Hoosier Gus Grissom.
Here's the view as we came in to land:





The museum is small but has quite a few artifacts and displays:





Outside are various aircraft and you can climb a Cold war era control tower and get a good overall view of them. Amongst them are the B-17 that MustangDriver has commented on in another thread, C-119 Boxcar, C-47, a B-25 that was used in "Catch-22", F-14, and a B-58. Others ,too.







Finally time to head home. On take off we passed by the active duty portion of the field, home to 434th Air Refueling Wing. Here are a few of their KC-135 Stratotankers:





Almost home and we passed over Mount Comfort and our own beloved "Hot Stuff". She's waiting for her chance to fly to Peoria in another couple of weeks. There she is on the uppermost ramp.





It was a fine trip and I would encourage anyone in the area to go up and have a look around.


PJ
PV-2 Harpoon "Hot Stuff"
http://www.amhf.org

[WIXerGreg]

Thanks for posting! I really need to get over there and go through the museum.

Have you heard anything more about them doing an airshow this year?

[hercules130]

PJ,

I don't suppose the 89 has been moved to the restoration hanger yet? It has only been a 2 months since my visit, but sure would love to see her go inside. The Grissom AIr Museum is a neat place operated by some really dedicated friendly volunteers. Thanks for the shots.

[The Inspector]

Interesting how loose ends become joined. The 319th was based @ Paine Air Force Base (now KPAE) before going to Korea, and again afterwards. They I believe, scored the first night jet interception/kill of the Korean War flying F-94's.

[PJ]

The museum web-site says the air show has been postponed for this year. They are having a car show the first Saturday of August. I believe that the F-89 is still outside. Apparently you can take sort of an insider tour on certain days of the week. The web-site may offer information on that. There was zero ramp and FBO activity when we were there....in fact, we had to find a way to get back out to the plane. My advice to anyone flying in to visit on a Sunday, have your emergency egress plan in place before you walk down to the museum.


Here are a couple more of the planes outside. I have to say, the old Dollar Nineteen is one of my favorite planes. They used to fly over my house in droves when I was little (early 1960's). They would fly from Grissom down to Bakalar (Columbus, Indiana). I'm sure they are what started my airplane mania.




CAG Tomcat





and the F-14 nose art:







PJ
PV-2 Harpoon "Hot Stuff"
http://www.amhf.org

[Django]

Thanks for sharing. I love the pic of the P-47 cowling.

[Second Air Force]

Yeah, General Kepner's nose art panel was a surprise to me, too. I didn't know he had seen to its survival.

Great thread!
Scott

[IndyJen]

They also have more AVG-related paintings in one spot than I have ever seen before.

And lots more of General Kepner's memorabilia, uniforms, and whatnot.

It's a pretty nice little museum. Some of those airplanes are showing highly visible signs of TLC, too, which is nice.

[mustangdriver]

Glad that you guys made it out to the museum. In the first picture, extreme right is the building that is going to house the B-17 after removing the outer wing panels.