Defunct Commemorative Air Force Units

[Mike]

The infamous Douglas Bader wing in the U.K.

Infamous?

They held an airshow in the U.K. at Coventry in 1988, to which most of the European operators showed up. The organisers then claimed there were hardly any spectators and ran away with the takings. It later went to court, but nobody ended up getting paid.

The Wing folded shortly afterwards.

[Mark Allen M]

... Delete ...

Whoops! thought you mean't "Dysfunctional"

[Lynn Allen]

The Hill Country Sqdn in Boerne, Texas and we had the Fi-156D, N-40FS. anybody know where she is now days?

[flyingsailor]

[*]Cleveland Wing/Buffalo Heritage Squadron - Cleveland, Ohio/Akron, New York

Was their a connection to these units other than the Buffalo group got the Cleveland Wing SNJ? I'm sad to hear the Buffalo group is now defunct. Where did the SNJ get assigned?

Wasn't there a Motor City Wing or Squadron in Detroit that had a static Buchon?

They never had an aircraft, but the was a CAF Wing in Akron Ohio called the Ace of Spades Wing. They existed in the 80s and spawned the MAPS Air Museum.

Jim

A small subset of the Cleveland Wing were from the Buffalo area, and when Cleveland decided to fold the Buffalo area members got together and formed a unit. A number of the Buffalo members were aircraft sponsors and as a result were awarded the T-6.

[DaveG]

Many years ago there was a unit in a Nashville, Tennessee. Maybe it was called the “ Music City Wing.” Nashville’s first billionaire donated his executive configured and very nice a Lockheed L-18 Hudson. It was a ZHoward 250 conversion. Two of his pilots put the deal together. However, they had very little money, only enough to repaint it in RAF markings.
The squadron didn’t make it and the aircraft was flown back to Midland for Re-assignment. Later it went to Colorado where it was promptly destroyed by a “loss of control” accident during takeoff. It cartwheeled on the left wing.

Around 1990, I visited the Smyrna airport with my father, who lived nearby. There was a plane there in British markings that looked like a Hudson but we couldn't get very close to it. I remember that it didn't look like it flew very often. Must've been this one, right?

[mike furline]

The Hill Country Sqdn in Boerne, Texas and we had the Fi-156D, N-40FS. anybody know where she is now days?

https://www.commemorativeairforce.org/aircraft/38

[ricusa]

I recall a squadron in Monroe Mich. Believe they had a TBM. Can not find a reference to one on the CAF sight.

[Randy Haskin]

Just a clean-up about the Memphis CAF unit:

The current squadron is called the "Delta Blues Squadron". It replaced the "Memphis Squadron," which was a different unit that shut down before the Delta Blues Squadron was formed.

The Wiki article appears to list both names in reference to the same unit.

The squadron operates T-6C N46SL/41-33578.

The Sponsor Group for T-33 N9124Z/51-6581 is part of the squadron as well.

[Avnut]

The units should not be removed from the Wiki page, but moved into a new section listing "former units". It is part of CAF history, why remove it. I'm not a history major, but a big buff of it and it can be hard to find things that once existed once they close outside of website that specialize in such things, i.e. Abandoned & Little-Known Airfields (http://www.airfields-freeman.com/). That is why I say but it back.

[Mark Allen M]

Just noticed this old thread. But agreed, why remove history from wiki?. Unless it’s proven to be bogus, leave the history there. Defunct or disbanded CAF units and squadrons important history.

[Lynn Allen]

The Hill Country Sqdn in Boerne, Texas and we had the Fi-156D, N-40FS. anybody know where she is now days?

Does anybody have any pictures or updates on the Storch?

Thank you

[Paul Stroud]

Lynn, it's with the SoCal Wing in Camarillo, who are fund raising for the restoration.

https://fundrazr.com/f25qJc?ref=ab_1Ekd ... EkdOxoCgtW

[Lynn Allen]

Lynn, it's with the SoCal Wing in Camarillo, who are fund raising for the restoration.

https://fundrazr.com/f25qJc?ref=ab_1Ekd ... EkdOxoCgtW

Paul, thank you for the intel...

Lynn

[Noha307]

Just noticed this old thread. But agreed, why remove history from wiki?. Unless it’s proven to be bogus, leave the history there. Defunct or disbanded CAF units and squadrons important history.

A very fair point. A similar discussion has come up in regards to warbirds that once existed, but were destroyed in crashes or scrapped. The consensus there was, more-or-less, that because the page included the word "surviving" in the title they should not be included. Furthermore, it was argued that they were no longer sufficiently notable and that Wikipedia is not an indiscriminate list of things. (Personally, I like the way that F2G, BuNo 88463, was handled in that while it is not listed in the surviving aircraft sections, it *is* mentioned in a image caption. It seems like a good compromise.)

However, I understand the opposite position as well. As a contrasting example, I made a point of including closed museums in the List of United States Air Force museums. Just because a thing no longer exists, doesn't mean it is no longer worth including.

The units should not be removed from the Wiki page, but moved into a new section listing "former units". It is part of CAF history, why remove it. I'm not a history major, but a big buff of it and it can be hard to find things that once existed once they close outside of website that specialize in such things, i.e. Abandoned & Little-Known Airfields (http://www.airfields-freeman.com/). That is why I say but it back.

For what it's worth, keeping track of the former units was part of the reason I created this thread. I completely understand the problem of "unknown unknowns".

Ideally, if they were sufficiently notable, they could be mentioned in the history section. However, I doubt all of them would fit that criteria. Alternatively, as you mentioned, there could be a section for defunct units, but finding references to support their inclusion might be difficult.

However, I don't have a good answer myself, so I started a request for comment on the talk page to try to establish some consensus. While I have to be careful of canvassing, if you would like to comment, please go ahead.