Highland Lakes Air Museum

In HONOR of those who served to forge the heritage of the United States;
In TRIBUTE to those who perished to provide peace and security for our country;
In GRATITUDE to those now serving.

The Museum has displays presenting Personal Mementos from participants in our countries wars, principally WW-II but also Korea, Viet Nam, and Afganistan/Iraq. Guns, Edged Weapons, Various Home Front Items, Uniforms, Helmets, and Aircraft and Ship Models are on display. The Museum emphasizes the contributions of the common soldier, seaman, and airman. The grand strategies of Presidents, Generals, and Admirals is left to other Museums. All artifacts in our Museum have been donated, principally by local residents or people having contact with local residents.

Specific exhibits include the front turret from a B-24 bomber, a cutaway radial engine of the type used in the AT-6/SNJ, a WW-II machine for making dog tags, a WW-II instrument flying trainer (Link Trainer), and an air-to-air missile. The B-24 turret is accessible, especially to our younger visitors. See if you can climb in. Then imagine you are 18 years old, perhaps one year out of High School, manning twin 50 caliber machine guns, wearing a bulky electrically heated flying suit with only a quarter inch of plastic between you and the best weapons the Luftwaffe or Japanese can throw at you. What happens if your aircraft is hit? Even if you are not wounded, with the bulky flight suit could you get out of the turret, don a parachute, and get out of the airplane? Many could not; 55,000 US AAF aircrew died defending our freedom in WW-II. Among them was our founder's brother. Sgt. Malcolm Smith's military records and medals are part of our collection.

Radial engines were arguably the most popular engine used in WW-II. All WW-II combatants employed them: all US bombers, all US Navy aircraft, all US transports including our C-47, the Japanese Zero, the German Fw-190 fighter, the British Tempest fighter, the USSR La-5/7/9 fighters, and many others. The question is, how do all those connecting rods arranged in a circle keep out of each others way and drive a propeller providing, in the final versions, 3500 hp? Engine designers solved this problem as long ago as WW-I. Take a look at our cutaway radial engine and discover the (really elegant) answer.

We have on display a WW-II Link Trainer (unfortunately, not operational). The Link Trainer was designed in the 1920s by Edwin Link. Initially it was sold to amusement parks. After a series of accidents while flying the air mail, in 1934 the Army Air Corps bought Link Trainers to train pilots in night and instrument flying. In 1935 the Japanese Navy became the second customer and used them in the training of its WW-II pilots. Approximately 11,000 Link Trainers were built.

The air-to-air missile on display is a 2.75 in. diameter Mighty Mouse unguided folding fin aircraft rocket (FFAR). FFARs were originally developed in the late 1940s by the Navy as an air-to-air weapon to be used by interceptors against heavy bombers. A salvo of rockets was considered more effective than a stream of cannon shells. It was widely used in the 1950s by USAF interceptors like the F-86D Sabre, F-89J Scorpion, F-94C Starfire and F-102A Delta Dagger. Effective range was about 3700 yards. Because its speed and spin rate were too low to effectively counter gravity drop, cross winds, and dispersion; accuracy was relatively poor.

A Request

We actively solicit additional artifacts, particularly from the World War II period. Unfortunately we usually do not have funds to purchase artifacts. Donations can result in a significant tax deduction for the contributor.

How to find us:

By plane:
BMQ is on the 182 radial of the Lampasas VOR (LZZ,112.5 MHz) at 27.3 nm.

Museum hours: