Museum of Flight to resume hangar project after a period of COVID-related limbo

After the pandemic put a damper on marketing and fund-raising efforts in the business community for most of 2020, some of that activity has slowly begun to make its way back.
According to Christine Lewis, Museum of Flight (MOF) executive director, fundraising to build a hangar at the Paulding airport to house operational aircraft in the museum’s collection had been “on pause” during the past year due to the pandemic.
“We had our doors closed for months during COVID,” she said. But Lewis, in attendance at the Paulding Chamber Awards event held at the airport on May 15th, said those efforts are resuming now. “Things are starting to open back up. The goal is to get back on the capital campaign. My personal director’s goal is to have the concrete pad down by the fall. Once that is down we can go from there,” she said.
And this project will need to work with other things going on as the airport board recently green-lighted their 5-year plan. “There are some infrastructure airport projects that Terry [Tibbitts] is working on that we’re trying to synch with,” Lewis said. “We’ll probably do interior improvements as we go.”
The hangar will house all of the flying inventory. She said both T-28s and the C-45 will fit, allowing for some additional space for whatever else.
Earlier this month attendees to the Paulding Chamber of Commerce Awards event held at the airport were able to tour The Museum of Flight. Shuttle vehicles moved back and forth between the airport terminal building and the MOF during the event.
MOF will complete its move from Rome with the construction of the the12,000 square-foot hangar, for which the steel was been donated by a MOF board member. The MOF’s hangar will house operational pieces of the museum’s inventory that cannot be exposed to the weather. The site is to the left of the terminal building.
Lewis also said that the MOF’s most recent annual fundraiser had gone quite well.
The MOF’s event on April 17th included a reception, a dinner, and a silent auction that benefits the Anna Shaw Children's Institute in Dalton, Ga.
The event was the 11th annual for the MOF, held for the second time at Paulding County’s airport. Proceeds from the event go toward museum operations.