LUPO,
Here's the EASY way.... this page has links to 31 aviation museums in California. Browse and decide!
http://aeroweb.brooklyn.cuny.edu/museums/ca.htm This page has links to 8 museums in Arizona. Enjoy!
http://aeroweb.brooklyn.cuny.edu/museums/az.htm Some of the ones I have visited and really liked:
Phoenix, AZ
Falcon Field Airport, 4800 Falcon Drive, Mesa, AZ 85215
Phone: 480-644-2444 Fax: 480-644-2419
"The Champlin Fighter Aircraft Museum is famous around the world as the premier fighter aircraft museum. This incredible international collection includes fighter airplanes that have made "Ace" - aircraft types with 5 or more air-to-air combat victories. The thirty-eight (38) planes seem ready to take off into the wild blue yonder. They are flyable! From the early open-cockpit biplanes of WWI through the powerful jets of Vietnam and Desert Storm - they're all here."
TUCSON, AZ
Unlike the Pima Air & Space Museum literally across the street, Davis-Monthan AFB is not a museum. The U.S. Military has always had plenty of aircraft and D-M is where they finally get parked, for whatever reason. There were other big "graveyards" after WWII, such as Kingman and other desert sites that were very busy "dispositioning" thousands of aircraft. A slag heap still exists today at Phoenix-Goodyear. So if they aren't going to be destroyed immediately, the warm and dry climate in Tucson is perfect....They used to have an all-day tour on the second Saturday of each month, but those days are long gone. D-M does conduct free public tours weekly on Mondays and Wednesdays at 0900 and 1030. It's a narrated tour that takes about an hour (not the eight-hour marathon they used to have).
Chino, California
7000 Merrill Ave
Chino, CA 91710
(909) 597-3722
"Founded over 44 years ago, The Air Museum "Planes of Fame," a nonprofit 501(c)(3) organization, is dedicated to preserving aviation history for the benefit of future generations. Currently, The Air Museum houses over 150 aircraft at its two locations, the main facility at Chino Airport in California and a satellite museum near the Grand Canyon at Valle Airport in Arizona. The Air Museum displays aircraft spanning the history of manned flight, from a replica of the Chanute Hang Glider of 1896, through modern space flight, and includes numerous milestone achieving test and research flight vehicles.
TUCSON, AZ
PIMA AIR AND SPACE MUSEUM
6000 East Valencia Road
Tucson, Arizona 85706 - USA
Tel: (602) 574-0462 / 0646 (area code changes to 520 on March 19,1995)
Fax: (602) 574-9238
"The Pima Air & Space Museum (PASM) features over 200 aircraft on display and has five large hangars totaling 100,000 square feet of exhibit space. An original WWII barracks contains an extensive model collection, arranged chronologically, which shows virtually all U. S. military aircraft from pre- World War I to the present....The 390th Memorial Museum is located in the center of the grounds and houses the B-17. Its exhibits detail the unit's World War II operations in the European Theater while assigned to the 8th Air Force. It is a museum within a museum."
San Diego Flight Museum
1424 Continental Street, Hangar #8
Brown Field Airport, San Diego California 92154 Phone: (619) 435-1075 Hangar: (619) 661-2516
E-Mail: sandiegofm @ hotmail.com
"The San Diego Flight Museum, a non-profit organization dedicated to the preservation of military aircraft for public demonstration and display"
Enjoy your trip!
