The sound of
thunder resonates as fighter jets zoom past the Hill Air Force Base. In the north west corner of the base lies an
important 30 acre piece of our American history, with more than 80 retired
military planes that have been flown in every war since WWI are parked inside
their hanger and outside for the public eye to see at the Hill Aerospace Museum.
The Hill Aerospace
Museum first opened their door to the public in 1986 as part of the US Air
Force Heritage Program to help preserve the planes that helped grant us our
freedom. The Aerospace program is an important part in our American History.
The museum started
when the US Government gave the Air Force permission to build a museum of their
retired airplanes close to their base. The Aerospace Museum had a rocky start financially.
They were unable to receive money from the government and could only receive
donations, so the museum started from the ground up, receiving these contributions
from people that came and visited its’ grounds. The Hill Aerospace Museum
started with no buildings; just a field with many large and beat-up planes from
the wars which our country fought in. As time went on they received the money
necessary to expand and move to their current facility in 1991.
The popularity of
the museum began to increase as time went on, and before long the museum was
receiving its visitors from all over the globe; people that came from miles
around just to get a chance to fulfill a childhood dream of seeing these
fantastic airplanes first hand. The museum now receives more than 180,000
visitors each year and has become the second most visited tourist attraction in
northern Utah (the first being Temple Square.)
The Museum has
four main areas; the first is the outside area which is a large field that
houses some their larger aircraft like the B-17 Flying Fortress and B-52 bombers.
The second is a visitor’s center where patrons can go and buy souvenirs, learn
about the science of planes, and interact with lots of hands on activities. The
third and fourth areas have two large hangers. These hangers house more than 80
different aircrafts arranged chronologically from the periods they were used from
the beginnings with the Wright Brothers to WWII and to the present day.
These hangers
house some of the most important aircraft and equipment in US history. This
collection includes the F-100 Super Saber which was the first plane to break
the sound barrier and the SR-71 Blackbird, which holds to this day records of
the highest flying plane of more than 80,000 feet (or 15 miles) in the air and flying at Mach 3 (or
three times the speed of sound.) That is fast enough to fly from New York to
London in a little over an hour. The Museum also has a model of the B-25 bomber
and the first Atomic Bomb that was dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. There are
also many real and used Browning .50 caliber machine guns whose creator Moses
Browning of Ogden Utah, made these guns and gave the United States and its allies
a weapons superiority in every conflict of the 20th Century.
Sheryl Martin from
Kaysville Utah is a flying veteran who has flown many of the types of aircraft
in the museum. He explained that you can tell whether a plane was from WWII or
younger by whether or not it has a propeller. The Air Force did not start using
jet engine planes until they wanted to break the sound barrier in the Korean
War. When asked about what he liked most about flying he said,
“I love the freedom. I love to be
in the air and feel like a bird free from the world beneath me.”
That
thrill of flying into the wild blue yonder remains in most people and the Hill
Aerospace Museum preserves this thrill in these planes and gives us an
opportunity to see first-hand our important American history and will continue
to be a place of learning, excitement and awe to those of all ages.
