A6M232・中村泰三・大戦機修復家・報国515資料館を運営

When I was in airplane mechanic school, we had rooms full of old books and equipment. Our program had been running since 1928, so stuff had just "piled up" Then one day, the FAA said it needed to be cleaned up. Of course, the public school system that ran the program ordered us students to stay late and throw everything from these storage rooms straight into the dumpster. Ironically, two of the students assigned to this were myself, and another student who ultimately became an archeologist. Everything had to go *into* the dumpster, but immediately thereafter, we took everything of historical value and loaded it in our cars. I have aviation materials dating back to 1909 sitting in my basement. Boxes upon boxes upon boxes of irreplaceable American history. Among them were documentation for WWI planes, WWII (particularly bombers), and materials from the jet age. I ultimately sold a ((real, original)) B29 operating manual to a group in Poland, and it was shipped to them via the Intrepid museum. A set of homebuilt drawings from the 1960s went to a young eagle from our EAA chapter Some memorabilia from the 1930s national air races went to Casey Putsch... as much as I can't stand the guy, I know he'll protect it. But the rest of it? It all sits in my basement. Valves from the B36, WWII maintenance manuals, periodicals from 1912 documenting the recent advancements in European aviation, every manual for the Lockheed P80A shooting star... ... all of it, waiting for the school to care about their history. Waiting to go back.