thedrifter
08-13-06, 08:22 AM
History envelops Tazewell County Air Show
MIKE STILL
Richlands News-Press/Clinch Valley News
Saturday, August 12, 2006
CLAYPOOL HILL - Spectators at Saturday’s Tazewell County Air Show may not have realized it, but they were enveloped by five decades of Cold War history.
At one end of the Tazewell County Airport ramp stood a reminder of the United States’ presence across the world – a pair of Marine Corps CH-46E assault helicopters dating from the mid-1960’s.
At the other end of the ramp, Francis Gary Powers, Jr. continued his quest to build a permanent reminder of the world in which his father found himself a symbol of U.S.-Soviet rivalry in 1960.
Powers, whose goal of establishing a Cold War museum is about to be realized, brought a sample exhibit to the airport Saturday.
With old Soviet part banners as a tablecloth for books, photos and information on the cooperative effort with the Smithsonian Institution, Powers said the public’s memory of the U-2 incident in 1960 is a mixed bag.
"People I talk to, if they’re 40 or older, have a very good memory of what it was like and of my father," Powers said as people stopped by his exhibit and asked questions. "If they’re younger than 40, they don’t always have an idea what I’m talking about. Some have a blank look."
Powers still shows signs of his heritage, with a face and haircut much like Powers, Sr., and three of his aunts and uncle joined him Saturday.
"I think he’s wonderful," Joan Powers Meade said of her nephew. "He sounds just like his father."
Meade said fewer and fewer people remember her brother, whose downing by a Soviet surface-to-air missile on May 1, 1960 electrified the world and embarrassed the Eisenhower administration.
"I remember seeing on the television about one of our pilots being show down over Russia and we weren’t allowed to say it was Gary," Meade recalled.
Powers Sr. had seen the controversy over 1960 fade and found a new career as a helicopter pilot in the 1970s before he died in an accident, Meade said.
"There’s a lot of people who came by after that and didn’t know he’d died," Meade added.
While his father’s part in international relations will be a prominent part of The Cold War Museum, Gary Powers Jr. said the museum will be more than that. Its setting in a former Nike anti-ballistic missile in Fairfax County near Washington, D.C. recalls the nuclear tension that existed between the United States and the U.S.S.R. after World War Two until the Soviet Union’s collapse.
In October, the Museum will break ground for its first building. Powers and another son of 1960 – Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev’s son Sergei – will join representatives of the Polish and Hungarian governments in a retrospective of the 50th anniversary of the Hungarian anti-Soviet uprising.
Across the airport ramp, Marine Lt. Colonel J.S. Whitaker and his crew were showing spectators the workings of their CH-46E Sea Knight – better known among Marines as ‘Frog’ or ‘Battle Frog’ because of its squat stance and the ‘mouth’ formed by its lower cockpit windows.
Whitaker’s ‘Frog,’ Bureau No. 154815, was part of a production batch from 1967 and 1968 and probably a Vietnam combat veteran of the late 1960’s.
"There’s still a piece of sheet metal on it that doesn’t look like it was part of the original skin or rework," Whitaker said.
Sea Knights are still a mainstay of Marine assault and cargo transport work even in today’s Iraq, said Whitaker, who recently returned from a tour in Iraq flying supply and combat support missions. His unit – HMM-774 at NAS Norfolk, Va. – contains several such veterans.
"We retired ‘411 a few months ago," Whitaker said. "It was the Sea Knight that flew the U.S. ambassador out of Saigon in 1975, and it’s going on display as a memorial."
Ellie
MIKE STILL
Richlands News-Press/Clinch Valley News
Saturday, August 12, 2006
CLAYPOOL HILL - Spectators at Saturday’s Tazewell County Air Show may not have realized it, but they were enveloped by five decades of Cold War history.
At one end of the Tazewell County Airport ramp stood a reminder of the United States’ presence across the world – a pair of Marine Corps CH-46E assault helicopters dating from the mid-1960’s.
At the other end of the ramp, Francis Gary Powers, Jr. continued his quest to build a permanent reminder of the world in which his father found himself a symbol of U.S.-Soviet rivalry in 1960.
Powers, whose goal of establishing a Cold War museum is about to be realized, brought a sample exhibit to the airport Saturday.
With old Soviet part banners as a tablecloth for books, photos and information on the cooperative effort with the Smithsonian Institution, Powers said the public’s memory of the U-2 incident in 1960 is a mixed bag.
"People I talk to, if they’re 40 or older, have a very good memory of what it was like and of my father," Powers said as people stopped by his exhibit and asked questions. "If they’re younger than 40, they don’t always have an idea what I’m talking about. Some have a blank look."
Powers still shows signs of his heritage, with a face and haircut much like Powers, Sr., and three of his aunts and uncle joined him Saturday.
"I think he’s wonderful," Joan Powers Meade said of her nephew. "He sounds just like his father."
Meade said fewer and fewer people remember her brother, whose downing by a Soviet surface-to-air missile on May 1, 1960 electrified the world and embarrassed the Eisenhower administration.
"I remember seeing on the television about one of our pilots being show down over Russia and we weren’t allowed to say it was Gary," Meade recalled.
Powers Sr. had seen the controversy over 1960 fade and found a new career as a helicopter pilot in the 1970s before he died in an accident, Meade said.
"There’s a lot of people who came by after that and didn’t know he’d died," Meade added.
While his father’s part in international relations will be a prominent part of The Cold War Museum, Gary Powers Jr. said the museum will be more than that. Its setting in a former Nike anti-ballistic missile in Fairfax County near Washington, D.C. recalls the nuclear tension that existed between the United States and the U.S.S.R. after World War Two until the Soviet Union’s collapse.
In October, the Museum will break ground for its first building. Powers and another son of 1960 – Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev’s son Sergei – will join representatives of the Polish and Hungarian governments in a retrospective of the 50th anniversary of the Hungarian anti-Soviet uprising.
Across the airport ramp, Marine Lt. Colonel J.S. Whitaker and his crew were showing spectators the workings of their CH-46E Sea Knight – better known among Marines as ‘Frog’ or ‘Battle Frog’ because of its squat stance and the ‘mouth’ formed by its lower cockpit windows.
Whitaker’s ‘Frog,’ Bureau No. 154815, was part of a production batch from 1967 and 1968 and probably a Vietnam combat veteran of the late 1960’s.
"There’s still a piece of sheet metal on it that doesn’t look like it was part of the original skin or rework," Whitaker said.
Sea Knights are still a mainstay of Marine assault and cargo transport work even in today’s Iraq, said Whitaker, who recently returned from a tour in Iraq flying supply and combat support missions. His unit – HMM-774 at NAS Norfolk, Va. – contains several such veterans.
"We retired ‘411 a few months ago," Whitaker said. "It was the Sea Knight that flew the U.S. ambassador out of Saigon in 1975, and it’s going on display as a memorial."
Ellie