Wings Over the Rockies Air and Space Museum

Wings Over the Rockies Air and Space Museum is located on the old Lowry Air Force Base in the Denver, Colorado area. The museum preserves Lowry AFB's operations history from 1938 to 1994 in its collections, archives, and research library. 

Information from the Wings Over the Rockies website:
"Transferred from the United States Air Force to a group of volunteers in 1994, Wings Over the Rockies Air and Space Museum is located in Hangar #1 of the former Lowry Air Force Base in eastern Denver, Colorado. Today, the museum boasts more than 182,000 square feet of hangar space full of iconic aircraft, space vehicles, artifacts, military uniforms, and much more. Visitors can also experience thrilling flight simulators, discover Wings Aerospace Academy, our enrichment program for 6th-11th-grade students, and participate in dozens of exciting museum-sponsored events."

The museum hangar containing the airplanes and educational exhibits is enormous!

My husband and I enjoyed exploring all the airplanes on exhibit and learning their history. There are both permanent and temporary exhibits and over 50 aircraft and space vehicles. Features of the museum's collection include the USAF's B-1A Lancer and B-52 Stratofortress bombers and many other militaries and general aviation aircraft.

There were different flight simulators at the museum to try and my husband had fun trying to land the Wrights brother plane --not an easy task in 1903 when their flight only took 12 seconds!!

In just the first 50 years of the Space Age, more than 64 astronauts have developed close ties to the State of Colorado. Through birth, university, or employment these space professionals have put Colorado on the leading edge of space exploration and study. 

The “Colorado’s Astronauts” exhibit offers Museum guests a look at some of the fine men and women with connections to the Centennial State and how they have helped transform our understanding of space.

One of the most famous Colorado Astronauts was John L "Jack" Swigert, an American test pilot, mechanical and aerospace engineer, United States Air Force pilot, and NASA astronaut. He was one of twenty-four astronauts who have flown to the Moon--his mission was on Apollo 13.   A piece of lunar rock that was collected by Apollo 15 was donated to Wings Over the Rockies in Swigert's memory by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration

There was an interesting exhibit about life on a space station.

The exhibit focuses on the groundbreaking science that the Center for the Advancement of Science in Space (CASIS) does on the ISS such as treatments for disease, new building materials, and consumer products

A unique collection of uniforms, gear, and more were on display in the World of Aviation attire in the Uniform Room. This permanent exhibition features dozens of items not found anywhere else in the world including specially designed artic flight suits, original Lowry Air Force Base photography equipment, and a letter to the father of a deceased soldier written by then-Secretary of War, Henry Stimson. 

One of the museum stars is the Star Wars X-Wing Starfighter, a 3/4-scale replica of the aircraft flown by Luke Skywalker in Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope. It is signed by numerous cast and crew including Harrison Ford, George Lucas, and David Prowse. Thanks to generous Rocky Mountain Fan Force volunteers and an agreement with Lucasfilm, this unique Star Wars heirloom has become a permanent part of the exhibits.

Each year, Wings Over the Rockies welcomes roughly 160,000 visitors representing all 50 U.S. states and 28-countries around the world.  We certainly enjoyed our visit and know we will be back to see more of it with our grandchildren one day. 

Wings Over the Rockies

Air & Space Museum

7711 East Academy Boulevard

Denver, CO 80230-6929

Hours:

Monday - Saturday: 10am – 5pm Sunday: 12pm – 5pm

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A Medley of Recent and Ancient Events

The month of May in Colorado is rainbow weather! Every day we see beautiful cloud formations that bring scattered rain showers and many rainbows to our front range location.

May is also the month of our last snowfalls on the front range. We sometimes wake up to trees covered with snow and by the middle of the day, when the sun is hot, everything has warmed up and melted.

The deer are hungry and enjoy all the new leaves on our shrubs and all the newly sprouted green grass. 

I took a blog break last week, as May is the end of the school year in our county and is full of school events, sports, and dance recitals. and I knew my computer time would be limited. We also attended the opening night of Opera Colorado's "The Marriage of Figaro," in Denver at the Ellie Caulkins Opera House. It is always a fun opera with Mozart's lively music.

Another exciting event we attended last week, as members of our community's historical society, was the History Colorado Center, Office of Archaeology and Historic Preservation nomination process that took place for a 97-year-old barn in our community to be placed on the National Register of Historic Places. Our historical society president worked for quite a while researching and compiling the necessary nomination requirements. It was reviewed by the Colorado State Register Review Board and the Colorado Historic Preservation Review Board at the meeting and approved unanimously to be sent to the National Park Service in Washington, D.C., for final approval.

This is the nominated John C. Schaffer Barn, both front and back views. At one time a cattle barn for Ken Caryl Ranch owner, John C Shaffer, it now is part of the community's equestrian center which boards horses. 

A slide show of the history and the archetectural details of the barn was presented to the review boards. If accepted, this will be the second property on Ken Carly Ranch that is on the National Register of Historic Places. The first is the pioneers' Bradford Perley House. You can read the interesting story about this house on my blog: The Bradford Perley House

Our community has a very long history of human presence, dating back to prehistoric times. Paleo Indians, Native Americans, explorers, pioneers, and ranchers have all left their mark along the Colorado front range. There have been many archeological digs in our area over the years and new discoveries are made all the time.  In the photo collage above you can see two display cases that are in one of our community centers, which show artifacts found on our community grounds.  The large piece of mandible bone is from a pre-historic mastodon and found by neighborhood boys in a creek. Dinosaur bones have also been found in our area.

An archeologist who is a member of our historical society brought the arrowhead to one of our meetings recently.   I am showing the back and front in the photos above. It is made from a piece of petrified wood and was carbon dated to 5,000 years ago! Many arrowheads have been found here but this one was unique. It was a thrill to be able to hold such an ancient man-made object in my hand.  We certainly live in an interesting place full of history and beauty!  May has certainly been an exciting month for many reasons.


If you'd like to read more about the dinosaurs that lived in our vicinity you can see more on this post: Dinosaur Ridge.
If you'd like to read more about mammoths and mastodons in our area, you can see more on this post: Lamb Springs--Where Mammoths Roamed.
If you would like to see what a front range archeological dig looked like you can read this post: Digging Up The Past

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I'm linking this post to the following blog events:

 Mosaic Monday, All Seasons, Blue Monday, Through My Lens Monday, Heart and Soul Link Up, Little Cottage Link Party, Blogging Grandmothers, Hearth, and Soul Link Party, You Are the Star Blog Hop, Good Random Fun, Nature Notes, Grand Social, Travel Photos, Photo Tunes, Happiness Is Homemade, Something Old Is New, Tuesday Treasures, Our World Tuesday, Ruby Tuesday, Tuesdays With A Twist, Wordless Wednesday on a Tuesday, Say Cheese!,  Party in Your PJ's, Wordless Wednesday, Nanahood WW, Oh My Heartsie Girl's Wonderful Wednesday, Your Whims Wednesday, Worldless Wednesday at Sky Girl, Wednesday My Corner of the World, Wonderful Wednesday,  Little Things Thursday,Thankful Thursday, Thursday Encouraging Hearts and Home, Thursday Favorite Things,  Pretty Pintastic Party, Friendship Fridays, Friday Photo Journal, Skywatch Friday, Pink Saturday, Saturday Critters, Over the Moon, Happiness Is Homemade

The Flowering Crabapple Capital of Colorado!

Who doesn't love the few glorious weeks every spring when blossoming trees of all sorts are at their peak? 

Pink crabapple blossoms highlighted by green hills...

...or against bright blue skies...

...lining sidewalks, parks, private home properties.

My town of Littleton, Colorado, is known as the "Flowering Crabapple Capital of Colorado."  with over 7,000 pink crabapple trees along the city's seven-mile crabapple route.  The trees were planted in the early 1970s as part of a city beautification plan spearheaded by the City of Littleton's mayor at the time, Vaughn Gardinier. He convinced the Littleton City Council to appropriate funds to plant the colorful trees along city streets and to encourage homeowners to plant them in yards throughout the city.

This short Youtube video shows some overhead views of the crabapple trees and tells the story of how they were planted some 40 years ago.  

In the 2010s, friends of the crabapples created a tax-exempt not-for-profit fund to allow residents and supporters to donate to the cause of replenishing and adding to the crabapple tree route.  Each year boy scout and civic groups plant more trees, now using a hybrid tree that produces blossoms but little or no fruit.

The trees are now blossoming, and for the next two weeks or so will add their color and beauty to the streets of Littleton. It is always something we look forward to seeing!

Although I live in Littleton, I'm far from the city center in an area closest to the foothills. The foothills have lost their snow cover and have turned green in the past few weeks.  Our area has lots of pine trees lining our streets and an occasional crab apple tree that the deer love in autumn when the apples fall. 

It has been wonderful to be back walking on our neighborhood's private trails...

...and enjoying the beautiful May weather!

I'm looking forward to seeing the new baby fawns that will be born this month. This one was resting in the shade of my front yard last summer. 

I hope you are having a Happy month of May! What signs of spring are you seeing in your area?

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I'm linking this post to the following blog events:

Amaze Me Monday, Mosaic Monday, All Seasons, Blue Monday,  Through My Lens Monday, Heart and Soul Link Up, Inspiration Monday, Blogging Grandmothers, Hearth, and Soul Link Party, You Are the Star Blog Hop, Good Random Fun, Nature Notes, Grand Social, Travel Photos, Photo Tunes, Happiness Is Homemade, Something Old Is New, Tuesday Treasures, Our World Tuesday, Ruby Tuesday, Tuesdays With A Twist, Wordless Wednesday on a Tuesday, Say Cheese!,  Party in Your PJ's, Wordless Wednesday, Nanahood WW, Oh My Heartsie Girl's Wonderful Wednesday, Your Whims Wednesday, Worldless Wednesday at Sky Girl, Wednesday My Corner of the World, Wonderful Wednesday,  Little Things Thursday,Thankful Thursday, Thursday Encouraging Hearts and Home, Thursday Favorite Things,  Pretty Pintastic Party, Friendship Fridays, Friday Photo Journal, Skywatch Friday, Pink Saturday, Saturday Critters, Over the Moon, Happiness Is Homemade