Flying high — Hill Aerospace Museum captures spirit of flight

There they sit: majestic metal birds, heroes of the sky that have served their country in war and peace.

They trace the history of aviation.

They bring to life the hazards of combat.

They capture the spirit of flight.

But the thing that Hill Aerospace Museum director Scott Wirz likes best about them is that they are more than just hardware.

"They represent people. You can't look at them without thinking of the missions they have flown, but it's the people who flew those missions that are most important," he said.

These planes represent "your United States Air Force," he says. And chances are very good that they represent a friend, a neighbor, a grandfather, a son, a daughter, a brother, a sister, a cousin, a father, a mother.

And he has seen what these planes do to those people who come to see them. "Maybe you have a grandfather who has hesitated to talk about his service. He comes here, and he opens up like it was yesterday. Maybe you have a mom who will be reminded of her service, or the service of others, during the Korean War. These planes trigger memories. They give you a new understanding of who these people are."

The purpose of the museum, Wirz says, is to preserve history but also to preserve memories and honor service.

To accomplish that goal, the Hill Aerospace Museum has more than 65 aircraft and some 3,000 other artifacts in its collection.

"We are the second-largest field museum in the country," he says. Only the one at Robins Air Force Base in Georgia is larger.

There's also a National Air Force Museum at Wright-Patterson in Ohio, which is also larger, but Wirz is justifiably proud of what Hill Air Force Base has been able to put together since the 1980s, when the idea was first broached as part of the United States Air Force Heritage Program.

The museum is operated largely by volunteers, many of whom are veterans and some of whom flew in these very planes.

Those volunteers "are the most wonderful group of people I've ever had the honor of working with," says Beth Halperin, who coordinates volunteer activity for the museum. "We have people ranging from high school and college age to a man who will turn 90 in December. We have veterans from World War II — their ranks are getting smaller all the time — and from Korea and Vietnam and other conflicts. When some of those veterans get talking, I could just listen to them all day."