kalamazookid wrote:
I wonder what will happen to the museum buildings? All those hangars and storage buildings... wow. This is pretty unbelievable. With the rate at which that musuem was growing, this is such a shock.
Probably demo'd and the land sold off for condos or mcmansions I guess.
Us East Coasters have lost a wonderful collection which was generously shared by it's benefactor, a real warbird enthusiast, by attending numerous airshows from Geneseo to Florida. This is sad news. Yes I am concerned that many of these aircraft will in fact end up as trophy pieces at some remote ranch/hangar never to be seen again by the public, readily available as they have been.
I think I will send a check for membership in the CAF. It seems everyone likes to complain about something they do, but if it wasn't for organizations like them or YAF and AAM, then we wouldn't see any warbirds at our east coast shows. I wish the AAM at Republic on LI would pick up the Wildcat but I don't think they're looking to expand the collection anymore and are concentrating on getting the PBY back in the air. Chris Baranaskas has sold off his collection and WOLI is no more. The newly re-cristened National Warplane Museum in Geneseo could surely use something, like a B-17, but I'm sure they can't afford it anymore at today's prices. It's hard to believe when they acquired Fuddy Duddy in 1986 from auction it was probably going for 300K if that. We lost it to the West coast where it hardly flies and now it sounds like Chuckie is heading out that way too. Tom Duffy has a nice collection but I'm not sure if he has been flying them much. Did he have anything at Reading this year? Unfortunately he is not on the roster for Geneseo this year so far.
Thank you Mr. Yagen for sharing the collection with us in the past and good luck with your future endeavors.