Great trip to Greensburg PA, 35 miles east of Pittsburgh to the Westmoreland Museum of American Art to see this wonderful show, The Tides of Provincetown. Next it will be in Wichita, KS, then back to the east coast. It is worth a drive to see it. This art colony was started in 1899 and the show is examples through the years.

I'd never heard of Greensburg (about 3.5 hours from Columbus), and on the map it looked like small town, but it isn't--at least not for people like me who grew up in towns under 3,000. About 16,000 says the 2000 census (when will new figures start appearing? They had all that stimulus money.) There's a nice video on the town website--click and you can see many of the sights of Main Street where we walked to find a place to have lunch. Many huge, lovely churches, and it's the county seat, and that building is quite grand, too. We saw lots of reviving businesses in the downtown area.

Conestoga trip to the Air Force Museum, pt. 3

After lunch in the cafeteria we attended the IMAX showing of "Fighter pilot, operation red flag" about the final training of a young pilot, with memories of his grandfather who fought in WWII.

It's so realistic, I had my eyes closed during most of the film. Then we continued our walking tour (without a guide) starting with the Korean War, then the Cold War, then Vietnam and southeast Asia, visiting the space flights and finally a look at our current wars (except Libya). We then gathered in the lobby for the next part of our trip, dinner at the historic Red Brick Tavern on Rt. 40 near London, Ohio.

I think this is a Thunderjet, used in the Korean War, but the light was so poor, I can't see the number. According to Wikipedia, "the Thunderjet became the Air Force's primary strike aircraft during the Korean War, flying 86,408 missions and destroying 60% of all ground targets in the war as well as eight Soviet-built MiG fighters." The better photo is from the museum site.

Symbol of the Cold War--the checkpoint and the Berlin Blockade. There was quite a display of the provisions flown into Berlin.

USAF 517 Grumman HU-16 B Albatross arrived here in July 1973. According to the website, "Grumman designed the versatile Albatross to meet a U.S. Navy requirement for an amphibious utility aircraft which could also operate from snow and ice with skis. During the Korean War, Albatrosses rescued almost 1,000 United Nations personnel from coastal waters and rivers, often behind enemy lines. They also made numerous dramatic and hazardous rescues in Southeast Asia, on occasion taxiing many miles over rough, open water when unable to take off."

I think the Iraq war display was in the Cold War area.

Conestoga trip to the Wright Patterson Air Force Museum

On Wednesday, April 21, our Conestoga group (an organization that supports the Ohio Historical Society) toured the National Museum of the United States Airforce at Wright Patterson Air Force base near Dayton, Ohio. Although we'd been driving past the direction signs for 43 years and wondered about it, we'd never been there. It's our loss. This is a fabulous place, and it's free! If you live within a hundred miles, it's an easy trip with good roads, and you won't regret it. Our tour guide, Dan, suggested beginning our morning tour with the mid-1930s to see what military aircraft was before the war and closing with the ending of WWII at lunch, then either taking in an IMAX film or accompanying him with more touring. Those who'd visited several times chose to continue touring with Dan (he was an outstanding guide), but we chose the IMAX.

Our tour began with the Boeing P26-A, the Peashooter, which was the first all metal monoplane, and ended with the plane Bockscar, that dropped the bomb the Fat Man atomic bomb on Nagasaki on Aug. 9, 1945. The lighting was so dim inside the huge building, most of my photos really didn’t turn out well enough to post, but here is the Peashooter from a media photo (outside) and mine. What we saw was a reproduction, but they were used by the U.S. from 1933 to 1938, and then later by the Chinese and the Phillipines. It was really amazing to see how the technology changed so quickly in just 10 years--particularly when we saw the German made V-1 and 2 rockets.

Use of the atomic bomb over Hiroshima and Nagasaki is still questioned by some, but I do believe it saved lives in the long run--particularly of Americans because the U.S. would have lost many more soldiers in an invasion. And I know it’s a controversial idea in these days of dithering about troup strength in old wars while rushing into no-fly zones in new wars with political negotiating only to kick the can down the road, but the point of war is to win (and that means killing people and destroying property and resources). But it probably also saved Japanese lives because incendiary bombs were used on 60 cities between November 1944 and July 1945 in Japan resulting in approximately 800,000 casualties and deaths. The use of the atomic bomb against Hiroshima and Nagasaki actually produced fewer casualties in each case than the 3-day bombing of Tokyo earlier in 1945. Considering how many Japanese gave their lives for 2 tiny islands, Iwo Jima and Okinawa (121,000), American leaders concluded, rightly I think, they would defend their homeland even more fiercely.

Photo from B-29 source

Gas pump ambush interview

Don't you love it when the local news folk interview people at the gas pumps? Oh, the stories you hear. Two days ago, the story was about "stacations," or staying close to home, but with a twist. The father of four being interviewed said that because of the gas prices, he couldn't take his children to King's Island this summer. What? The admission price for a family of 6 must be about $160, parking $10, then the food and drinks could easily rack up another $60-75. King's Island is about 200 miles round trip from here, and gas is about $1 more per gallon than last summer. He had a full-size van at the pump. Do the math, Dad. The price of gas over and above what you paid for last year's trip is the cheap part. You're building memories.

Today in Columbus, gas is $3.86 (Speedway, Mill Run).