We love our Museum members!

By Amy Quick, Director of Membership

February is finally here.

And that means it is Member Appreciation Month!

If you’re not a Museum member, then it is the perfect time to join. Each new and renewing member will receive free IMAX movie passes, as well as the added benefits of a Museum membership, which includes gift store discounts, free admission to more than 250 museums through the ASTC program, invitations to members-only events (aka Member Appreciation Month!), and free admission to the Museum!

Our schedule for the month is packed with activities for both kids and adults. Already the “Change Your View of Our Universe” presentation on Feb. 13 is filling up (featuring John Cowens, our latest guest blogger), so call today and reserve your spot.  Don’t forget that the Paper Airplane Guy is returning on Feb. 27, and we are offering a members-only breakfast before his exclusive presentation. That same night, the Museum will host a free adults-only wine tasting featuring Evergreen Vineyards wines and a free showing of Fighter Pilot.

We will have a members-only drawing every day for those of you visiting the Museum during the month. Museum Guidebooks, Spruce Goose coffee mugs and IMAX passes are just a few of the prizes.  Each member can enter to win with each visit to the Evergreen Aviation and Space Museum, culminating in a grand prize drawing for a hot air balloon ride!

We all are looking forward to fun-filled month and are excited to see all of you in the coming days!

Click here for a complete Member Appreciation Month schedule.

Large Binocular Telescope

By John Cowens, guest blogger

 

The Large Binocular Telescope (LBT)

Raised in Bluffton, Ind., John Cowens received a bachelor’s and master’s degree from Indiana University. He is a master elementary and middle school teacher with 32 years of experience. During his teaching career, Cowens was awarded several prestigious teaching awards, and  from 1999 – 2007, he was also a science columnist for Teaching K-8 magazine and received an award for “contributing outstanding science lessons.”  Since 2002, he has served as NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory’s Solar System Ambassador and disseminates space exploration information (i.e. images from the Hubble Space Telescope) to the general public via school assemblies, general public meetings, which often include star parties with his 14” reflector telescope.

Cowens will be presenting during Evergreen’s Member Appreciation Month in February, and will also be a regular speaker at the Museum Star Parties this summer.

The Hubble Space Telescope (HST) received its last repair in May 2009, and if all goes well, this amazing telescope should perform until 2014.  In the meantime, NASA is preparing to place The James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) into space in 2014, which  is designed to complement the HST by seeing only infrared.

Due to stunning images from the Hubble Space Telescope and land-based telescopes, astronomers are determined to answer more questions by looking closer to unlock more “secrets” of the universe.  However, extremely large telescopes are needed to see farther and clearer into the vast universe.

 One particular telescope constructed on top of Mt. Graham in Arizona is called the Large Binocular Telescope (LBT) and has partners in the United States, Italy and Germany.  Since human eyes have binocular vision, this telescope operates similarly by combining images produced by the slightly different perspectives of each eye. Unlike all monocular telescopes, the Large Binocular Telescope will produce three-dimensional images with depth!

The LBT will collect light from two circular mirrors that are 8.4 m (27.5 ft.) in diameter and will have the equivalent light-gathering capacity of an 11.8m (39 ft.) instrument and a resolution of a 22.8m (75 ft.) telescope! These two huge main mirrors were spun-cast honeycomb mirrors developed and fabricated in the Steward Observatory Mirror Lab (Tucson, Ariz.). The secondary mirrors will be fully “adaptive,” which means the surface of the mirror can be fine adjusted by a computer in real time to compensate for our atmosphere’s instabilities. With all parts working precisely together, the LBT will achieve angular resolutions very close to the theoretical limits even when the atmospheric conditions are not perfect. Astronomers will also combine the light from the two mirrors (called “interferometric mode”) which will achieve images with 10X better resolution than the Hubble Space Telescope.  As astronomers combine the large field-size and high angular resolution, the LBT will provide astronomers with a unique facility for exploring the universe.

As of today, the Large Binocular Telescope will be the most powerful telescope on Earth… but not for long! Hawaii was chosen to build the world’s biggest telescope on top of a dormant volcano that is 13,796 feet above sea level by 2018. The telescope’s mirror will be almost 100 feet in diameter and have light-gathering ability to see objects some 13 billion light years from Earth. This will give astronomers a glimpse of the first stars and galaxies that formed some 400 million years after the Big Bang.

For more information on the Large Binocular Telescope, go to: http://lbtwww.arcetri.astro.it/LBT%20Brochure/Astronomy%20Magazine.pdf

Large Binocular Telescope (LBT)

Inside the LBT Observatory

Diagram of the LBT

Global Hawk Arrives

Photo from airforce-technology.com

By Stewart Bailey, curator

In the midst of one of the coldest winter spells that Oregon has seen in a while, the Museum moved its newest acquisition, which was most warmly received. The new artifact was a mock-up of the Northrop-Grumman RQ-4 Global Hawk reconnaissance UAV.

The Global Hawk is one of the most sophisticated tools available to military planners in the current war on terrorism, and operates regularly over Iraq and Afghanistan. Similar in mission to the U-2 spy plane, the Global Hawk has the ability to stay in the air for more than 36 hours and can survey up to 40,000 square miles in a day. It is equipped with Synthetic Aperture Radar that allows it to see through clouds and sand storms as well as infra-red (heat) and optical sensors that can send data back via a satellite link for immediate review by commanders on the ground and back in the U.S. What makes it unique is that it does not have a pilot on board, but rather is directed half way around the world from its home base in northern California. Like its famous predecessors, the U-2 and SR-71 Blackbird, the RQ-4 is operated by the 9th Strategic Reconnaissance Wing at Beale Air Force Base near Sacramento.

Although most people tend to think of UAVs (Unmanned Aerial Vehicles) as small, the Global Hawk is a real “monster.” Forty-four feet in length and having a 116 foot wingspan, it is wider than the horizontal stabilizer of the Spruce Goose! It cruises at more than 400 miles per hour and can hit a ceiling of 65,000 feet, all while carrying a ton of surveillance equipment. With size and performance like this, the Global Hawk is certainly not an ordinary radio-controlled airplane.

The mock-up that the Evergreen Aviation & Space Museum acquired was built for and donated by the Northrop-Grumman Corporation. It was originally used to show off the design to the U.S. Air Force and ended up being put on display at the National Museum of the United States Air Force (NMUSAF) in Dayton, Ohio. After NMUSAF received an actual RQ-4 from the Air Force, they returned the mock-up to Northrop-Grumman, who in turn gave it to Evergreen. Stored in a warehouse in Columbus, Mississippi, a crew from Evergreen went down to pick it up during the first week of December. Utilizing a truck and driver from the Evergreen EAGLE division, the mock-up made the cross-country trip in five days and was off-loaded at the Museum on Thursday, December 10. It will now receive some TLC from the Museum’s restoration crew, before it is re-assembled and hung in the Aviation Museum building for all to enjoy.

Lockheed Constellation Update

By Stewart Bailey, curator

If you ask any aviation enthusiast to rank the top ten most beautiful aircraft ever built, chances are the Lockheed Constellation will appear on that list. 

Developed by Lockheed just before World War II, the Constellation owed much of its early capabilities to its lead customer, TWA, and the airline’s major stock-holder, Howard Hughes. With the outbreak of World War II, the Constellation first flew as a military transport and served as the C-69, but after the war it returned to its roots as an airliner. Because the Constellation was designed to have intercontinental range, many were built for the U.S. Air Force and U.S. Navy as early warning radar aircraft.  They served for more than 20 years, keeping track of targets in the air and on the surface of the ocean during the Cold War.

While most Constellations long ago had a meeting with the scrapper’s torch, a few survived and today are prized pieces in the collections of museums or private individuals.  In May 2009, the Evergreen Aviation & Space Museum joined those ranks when it was awarded a Lockheed EC-121T early warning Constellation by the Government Services Administration (GSA) Federal Surplus Program. The aircraft, serial number 52-3417, served as a maintenance trainer for the University of Montana’s aviation mechanics school at Helena, Montana for the last 28 years. Excess to the college’s needs, it was offered up for disposal through the GSA, and of the several proposals, Evergreen’s was declared the winner.

Because of the excellent condition of the aircraft, a decision was made to make it flyable for a one-time ferry flight to its new home in McMinnville. Despite its condition, there is still plenty of maintenance to do, and starting in October, properties director Terry Naig along with volunteers from the Museum began the work. 

Their first task involved cleaning out 28 years of debris from birds nesting in the aircraft, and after two weeks, the “Connie” is reported to have smelled much better. The crew is also installing material to keep the birds from getting back in, as well as cleaning the years of grime and oil off the aircraft so its structure could be inspected. The next step will involve moving the old veteran to the Helena Airport, where further maintenance can be performed and the engines can be tested.

For more information about this project, check out this article on the Helena Independent Record web site.

Amazing Photos!

By Philip Jaeger, Director of Operations

The Museum hosted our first Photo Contest this year. It was more of an experiment than anything else, but we were astonished by the number of amazing entries that were submitted. Oftentimes we hear that our airplanes can be difficult to photograph because they are  static objects and the Museum is made up primarily of windows that can cause unusual lighting situations. But, some of these photographers made these planes come alive.

I hope you enjoy looking at them, and make sure to keep taking photos for next year’s contest!

Winning Artifact Entries

Taken by Paul Carter. Photo of the A-4 Skyhawk.

Taken by Even Quach. Photo of the 747 in front of the Museum.

Taken by John Ousterhout. The Bell 47 helicopter

Taken by Rusty Denham. Photo of the T-33.

Taken by Diana Powe. Photo of Fokker Dr. 1 Triplane in a dogfight with the Nieuport 17.

Winning Event Entries

Taken by Cassie Baker. Photo from the 2nd Annual Loose Goose Hot Air Balloon Fly-Out

Taken by Rusty Denham. Photo of the night burn of the 2nd Annual Loose Goose Hot Air Balloon Fly-Out

Taken by John Ousterhout. Photo of the 747 landing in McMinnville.

Winning Employee Entries

Taken by Jim Cameron, docent. Photo of his grandson, Tyler Cameron, after the 747 landing in July.

Taken by Angie Garcia, events coordinator. Photo of the 2nd Annual Loose Goose Hot Air Balloon Fly-Out.

Taken by Stewart Bailey, curator. Photo of the F-106.

H-34 Choctaw Helicopter

By Philip Jaeger, Director of Operations

The Evergreen Aviation & Space Museum recently welcomed a new arrival, the Sikorsky H-34 Choctaw helicopter.  As always, the helicopter seemed to grow once it got inside the building. It always seems that once I have a spot picked out for an aircraft, it is never the right size. 

The aircraft, as you can see in the pictures below, started out in bad shape. The Museum restoration crew in Marana, Arizona refurbished the helicopter to how you see it now.  As they were cleaning the paint of off the helicopter, they noticed it had the markings of the South Vietnamese Army, which meant that the aircraft had seen combat at one point in its life. So, our curator decided to repaint the aircraft with those markings. 

From the research we have done, this is only one of 20 that were given to the South Vietnamese from the Marines in 1969. Later, some of these were reclaimed by the U.S. Army. In its standard configuration, the helicopter can hold up to 16 troops. Sikorsky built 1,000 of these helicopters in total.  To the best of my knowledge we are only one of five museums to have an H-34 Choctaw on display.

We hope you can come out and see this large helicopter inside the Aviation Museum.  We have more aircraft coming this year so stayed tuned to the blog and facebook for more updates.

The H-34 Choctaw when the Museum first acquired it

The H-34 after restoration

The H-34 with the restoration crew in Marana, Arizona.

The H-34 repainted with its original South Vietnamese markings

The John R. Jankowski Memorial Oak Grove

By Philip Stuva, Director of Development

On Saturday October 10, 2009, with family and friends from six different countries in attendance, Evergreen Aviation & Space Museum unveiled a monument in remembrance of John R. Jankowski.

 Jankowski was born to a family of foresters in Poland in 1913. John became an officer in the Polish Army and was captured by the Russians and made a prisoner of war in 1939 and miraculously managed to avoid the fate of those in Katyn. He was handed over to the Germans in a prisoner exchange and was interned at stalags in Austria, Germany and Northern Italy. In 1944 John was liberated by the United States Army and rejoined the Polish “Free” Army in Southern Italy and remained there until 1947. Fearing for his safety, John’s parents requested that he not return to Poland after the war. John immigrated to England and then to Lethbridge, Alberta, Canada and would spend a total of 26 years away from his beloved family in Poland. In 1960, John moved to McMinnville, Oregon and in 1961 opened the Safari Motor Inn. Mr. Jankowski became a highly respected businessman and member of the McMinnville community for the next 49 years. During those early years in McMinnville, John met a man named Delford Smith who was starting his own fledgling aviation business called Evergreen. The Safari became the meeting center for the Evergreen Family of Companies and John became a trusted friend to Mr. Smith. John would even pick up the Smith boys from school and give them a warm meal if Del was delayed on a business trip. After a successful career in the motel and restaurant business, John retired at the age of 90 in 2004. John passed away in his place of residence in McMinnville, Oregon, on Friday, March 20, 2009.

 As part of the ceremony, Evergreen Aviation & Space Museum renamed their oak grove as the John R. Jankowski Memorial Oak Grove and planted an Oregon White Oak in his honor. John’s granite memorial reads:

 Memorial Oak Grove Dedicated to John Rabiez Jankowski 

1913-2009

 On the 10^th of October, 2009 an oak was planted at the Memorial Oak Grove dedicated to John (Janek) Jankowski in remembrance of his life. We do not count the years John was with us, neither do aged oaks, and both firmly hold their proud heads high.

 The most respected in the whole clan, John spent his life way from his homeland, Poland, in the United States. John made history by escaping death and miraculously managed to avoid the fate of those in Katyn. He was thankful to God for the fact that He did not let him die at the mercy of Stalin’s executioners.

 Along with the forests and angel choirs, an oak will keep springing upwards for many ages. Every day, beginning early in the morning, it will praise John and the other survivors of the atrocities of World War II.

 -Written by Kazik Rykowski, Wykno, Poland 2008.

 Delford Smith wrote that “This Oak Grove stands as a testament to the long-lasting legacy of John Rabiez Jankowski. We are grateful for his outstanding leadership and commitment to free enterprise. His patriotic spirit and benevolent nature is an inspiration to us all.”

The John Jankowski memorial monument

Jackie Jankowski, John's wife, taking a picture of the monument.

Delford Smith, Evergreen International Aviation founder, helps Jackie place soil on the oak tree that was planted in John's memory.

A World in Miniature

by Stewart Bailey, Curator

For thousands of years, people have made scale models of objects from the world around them. From models of royal barges found in the tombs of Egypt’s Pharaohs, to complex three dimensional architectural renderings, models have been used to bring the real world “down to size.”

On Saturday, September 19, the Evergreen Aviation & Space Museum hosted the largest display of modeler’s art in Oregon, as the Oregon Historical Model Society put on their annual model show and contest. Several hundred modelers from around the region, including many from Oregon, Washington and California, came to display their work in 65 different categories, covering not just aircraft, but just about anything that can be modeled, including ships, cars, trucks, military vehicles and spacecraft. There were even seven categories for Junior Modelers (under the age of 18), to showcase their work.

Before registration ended at noon, over 440 models had been entered in the contest, representing the pinnacle of the modeler’s art. While it was sponsored by a chapter of the International Plastic Modelers Society, the models did not necessarily need to be made of plastic to compete in the contest. A good number of them featured other materials including wood, metal and polyvinyl resin.

Typically, the models begin life as a plastic kit that one would find at their local hobby shop, but the end result is anything typical. Often the modelers modify the kit to present a particular variant or version that appeared at a particular historic period. Along the way they will probably spend hours and hours in research to get the historical details and markings right, and even more time in dealing with the tiny aesthetic details that make the models a true work of art.

Amongst the top winners in the contest was a highly modified model of a Piper Cub that was re-worked to represent a U.S. Navy HE-1 air ambulance, which took home the People’s Choice Best of Show Award. Other magnificent models included a 1/350th scale model of the first U.S. aircraft carrier, the USS Langley, and a diorama of a combat bulldozer cleaning up the debris of World War II.

Along with the models on display, there were 22 tables of kits, supplies and reference material for sale, and an hourly raffle that was stocked with hobby material. Also, young modeling newcomers could try a free Make-and-Take activity where they could build their own model, with the help of experienced hands.

All in all, it was a full day of activities and wonderful arrays of jewel-like miniatures; each a part of the real world, brought down to table-top size! Check the Evergreen Aviation & Space Museum web site for the date of next year’s event.

 

Best in Show - U.S. Navy HE-1 air ambulance

USS Langley - The first U.S. aircraft carrier

World War II Bulldozer Diorama

F4U-1 Corsair

Behind the Scenes at the IMAX

by Philip Jaeger, Director of Operations

Many of you have probably turned your head to stare at the back wall of the IMAX and looked up at the windows impatiently waiting for your movie to start. So in this blog, I thought it might be a good idea to tell you what happens on the other side of those windows.

Starting off, the IMAX Theater at the Evergreen Aviation & Space Museum is one of the best in the world in terms of sound, quality of image and multi-use capability. The sound comes from six speaker systems arranged throughout the theater. Each individual speaker cone is laser aligned into the theater for an optimum large sweet spot of sound. It took one week to set the sound levels so that all the speakers sound exactly the same on every frequency the human ear can detect. The IMAX SR projection system is a film-based system.

You have probably noticed the large movie screen (the largest one in Oregon) in front of you, but did you realize it was painted silver and covered with holes? The holes allow all the sound energy to bounce freely throughout the theater and not move the screen like a giant bed sheet in the wind. The silver paint is part of the 3D process.  

Inside the projection booth, there are two giant projectors, one for the left eye of film and one for the right eye of film. If we are running a normal 2D movie, we can use either projector by itself. But to make a 3D movie, we need a film for each eye. The films are run through the projectors at the same time, and then the image is projected through a polarized piece of glass. To keep the image polarized (especially the colored light that is actually the image), the screen is painted silver to reflect the light like a giant mirror. Then with your 3D glasses on, your left eye only sees the left image and your right eye only sees the right image, and then your brain fuses the two together. 

You might notice in the pictures some really large black metal circles. These are the platters that hold the film while it is playing. For a normal 45 minute IMAX movie, there are two and half miles of film per eye. The total weight is more than 200 lbs. For a two and a half hour movie, that jumps up to a six foot diameter platter that holds eight miles of film, which weighs over 700 lbs. One other fun fact about the film is that each individual IMAX frame holds 50 MB of data, if digitized, and is the equivalent size to 10 regular motion picture frames. 

I hope you enjoyed your tour behind the scenes, and make sure to stop by and see our new IMAX 3D movie Wild Ocean.

IMAX SR projectors looking toward the Evergreen IMAX Theater.

 

Chief Projectionist Peter Gabriel threads the right eye of Wild Ocean 3D.

 

Director of Operations Philip Jaeger pointing to the left eye film platter.

 

Looking at all the IMAX equipment with the film platters in the foreground.

 

IMAX films are delivered in in either big shipping crates or in small pizza box size crates that hold five minute chunks of film that we assemble ourselves.

 

Director of Operations Phil Jaeger holds a six foot in diameter film platter, which stores the two and a half hour IMAX movies.The sound racks.

New Member Program

By Philip Jaeger, Director of Operations

I’m excited to report that we welcomed 202 new members to the Museum during the month of August. That is a record for us! To continue our hot streak, the Membership Department has announced a new add-on option to our membership packages.

As many of you may know, we are the only Smithsonian Affiliate Museum in Oregon. Thus, we are giving our members a chance to enjoy the benefits of a Smithsonian membership as well as an EASM membership.

From Beth Wilson, Museum Membership Director:

“In early 2009, the Evergreen Aviation & Space Museum became an Affiliate of the Smithsonian Institute. This prestigious affiliation allows us to offer our members the opportunity to become members of two museums at once. Beginning September 1, 2009, for an additional $20 per year, Museum Members can choose to enjoy the benefits of a Smithsonian membership as well as the many wonderful benefits they receive from their Evergreen Aviation & Space Museum membership.”

So, current EASM members are eligible to sign up for the Smithsonian Affiliate membership for the $20 fee. The additional Smithsonian membership is annual, and you get to choose between the Air & Space magazine (6 issues) and the Smithsonian magazine (12 issues) – normal newsstand price is $48 per year. 

Evergreen Aviation & Space Museum dues are not increasing to include the Smithsonian membership—it is an add-on option available for Museum members only. Associate and Corporate Members must have an active membership to purchase the additional Smithsonian membership.

The full list of benefits included in the Smithsonian Affiliate Membership will be available at the Visitor Information Desk in the Aviation Museum and the Welcome Desk in the Space Museum, as well as on our Web site, www.EvergreenMuseum.org. 

If you would like to purchase this membership add-on, forms are available at the locations listed above, and can be submitted at any of the membership sales locations. Contact Beth Wilson in the Membership Department at 503.434.4007 or membership@sprucegoose.org with questions.