Donations to the Waco Air Museum

Description

The WACO Aircraft Company was the largest manufacturer of civil aircraft in the country in the late 1920’s & early 30’s & this museum is dedicated to the plant & the employees that made it great.

Historic WACO Field (1WF)

With the help of the WACO Historical Society (founded in 1978) members & many generous donors & supporters, Historic WACO Field opened in 1997. The field consists of a 77 acre site & features a 2200 foot runway (2000 feet usable) south of Troy, Ohio. Historic WACO Field is maintained by WACO volunteers & is constantly receiving upgrades & improvements, but we are always in need of additional volunteers to assist in the upkeep of the site.

In 1997, the first building to be erected on WACO Field was an historic 1856 barn relocated to the premises in a traditional barn raising. It was restored thanks to a generous grant provided by the Troy Foundation. Over 300 volunteers from all over the United States helped rebuild the barn. The barn has received its occupancy permit & has been incorporated into the active museum buildings.

The second building project on WACO Field was the 7500 sq ft hangar which became home to the WACO Aircraft Museum, Research Library, Classroom/Conference Room, Gift Shop & Museum Offices. The next addition was a new Museum Hangar, built by Bruns construction & completed in September 2009 through a generous grant from the Ohio Cultural Facilities Foundation. This new building is home to vintage WACO aircraft, displays & the history of the WACO Aircraft Company. A Quonset hut & picnic shelter were added in 2012.

Historic WACO Field also has a radio-controlled aircraft flying field located on site which is home to the WACO Barnstormers RC Club. We have a separate runway & shelter in place specifically designed to accommodate RC Aircraft.

WACO Aviation Learning Centre

The WACO Historical Society, in addition to preserving aviation’s past, is also dedicated & actively works to nurture aviation’s future through its Learning Centre programs.

The goal of the Learning Centre is to use aviation related hands-on teaching projects to inspire & educate. We want to reach students, assist & train teachers, & inspire adults to support life- long learning.

The Education Director has developed an outreach program designed to foster science, technology, engineering & math. We emphasize inquiry based learning & the engineering & design process as our means to develop the student’s inquisitive & creative aspects of learning. Collaboration among students is encouraged as a key aspect of real world problem solving.

Many of our programs demonstrate the principles of flight & engage participants in making & flying hot air balloons, kites, model airplanes, paper rockets, Estes rockets, hovercraft, & more! WACO is where learning is made fun & where making paper airplanes is encouraged. Whenever possible, we use actual aviation experts as the teachers & leaders of the activities.

The WACO Learning Centre conducts programs with schools, preschools, church groups, Scout Troops, home school families, Civil Air Patrol posts here at the Field & at other local airports.