While looking through some old snapshots a few weeks ago, I found this picture I took in 1990 at the old Florence Air and Missile Museum. That's the last surviving BTD-1 Destroyer, which Florence had on display for a long time in a spurious color scheme.
The Florence museum used to be a must-see on my family's road trips through the area. I think we visited there three times while the museum was open. The first time we visited, I was really young and overawed by everything. Here were all these cool old airplanes on display, just like the airplanes I'd seen in the countless picture books I had by that point. That early in life, I was mesmerized by the B-29, and sure enough there was one there. It was in pieces, awaiting reassembly, but it was a Superfortress, darn it. Also in the museum was a C-97, the transport that was adapted from the B-29 design, and I was beside myself. The other airplane at Florence that really made an impression on me was the F-102A that was on display. I thought that delta wing was so cool. It was kind of a scary-looking airplane, and I loved it. In contrast, the C-97 looked to me, with that chinless forward fuselage and that swath of cockpit windows, like an airplane that was really friendly.
The real treat was that in an adjacent lot, there was a C-124 Globemaster transport on display. Not only could you walk around it, but you could clamber up this huge metal stair and actually go up inside it. At the time, I was young and not really that bright, and I remember being half-afraid that they'd start it up and we'd go flying. All I could think about was the Bugs Bunny cartoon where he's on the huge airplane that parks over his rabbit hole, because to my young mind that airplane was exactly like the one in the cartoon. That C-124 was the first real-life airplane I ever went aboard.
At the time, the Florence museum was in pretty passable repair. The grass was cut, and though the airplanes were weathered they didn't seem completely neglected. The pictures I have from that first visit bear this out. But, as it turned out, time wasn't kind to the museum, as we found out when we returned seven years later. Some of the airplanes were gone (most notably, the C-124 had been flown to Charleston for display, and had been replaced by an NC-121K). The airplanes were looking a little worse for wear, and the grounds didn't seem that tended. You could actually sneak into the H-21 if you wanted, and at my father's prompting I climbed aboard, sat in the scavenged cockpit, and my father took a picture of me sitting in the pilot's seat holding the stick.
The indoor exhibits were still there, though, and had the same feeling I remembered, of being in an attic with a lot of neat stuff there. There was clutter, and there were some things that were homemade, but some of the stuff in there could give you a neat surprise sometimes. I remember one of the marquee attractions was one of Alan Shepard's suits made for the Apollo 14 mission, though I don't know if it was the actual flight article (it looked a little too pristine, I recall). There was also a tiny moon rock brought back from Apollo 12, sealed in a display case. A big display inside the museum told the story of the incident where a B-47 dropped an atomic bomb on a farm near Florence (the atomic warhead didn't detonate, obviously). It was also not long after the Challenger accident, and there was a display honoring 51L astronaut Dr. Ron McNair, who was from nearby Lake City.
Three years later, we passed through Florence again and dropped off at the museum. It was obvious the museum was moribund, and Hurricane Hugo had plastered it. The grass was getting overgrown in some places, and the remaining airplanes were looking doggy. The C-119 was gone, the F-101 looked like it'd been through a hailstorm, and my beloved YF-102A was peeling in sheets. I didn't know it, but that would be my final visit. Rumors began to fly that the museum was going to close. Apparently, it came close at one point, but some volunteer effort came in at the last moment and the museum hung on for a bit. Some of the airplanes began to get a little care. Still, the damage was done. The museum was once a big attraction, but the completion of nearby I-95 put a big hurt on attendance; no longer did you need to pass through Florence (and right past the museum) to get to Myrtle Beach.
Despite the help of the volunteers, it was all over soon. In 1997, the museum closed for good, and the land was designated for use for a new entrance for the adjacent regional airport. About a month after the museum closed, I was in the Florence area and stopped to take a last look through the fence at these relics from my youth. It was hard to look at. Among other things, I remember my poor C-97 sitting there in her corner of the museum, her rudder blown ninety degrees to port. I didn't have a camera, and I'm glad I didn't. It hurt too much to see. The wrecking didn't take too long to begin.
Some of the airplanes got scrapped or parted out. The C-97's cockpit was saved, but the rest of the airplane was cut up. Others, thankfully, were saved. The B-47 was disassembled, trucked to the Mighty Eighth museum near Savannah and reassembled, and every time I pass by it on I-95 I shout out a hello to my old friend. The BTD-1 and the RB-57A were snapped up by the Wings of Eagles museum in Elmira, New York, and have been restored. Even the disassembled B-29 ended up being put back together again.
A good bit of the collection ended up going about 150 miles northwest, to the Carolinas Air Museum in Charlotte. Among those saved that way is my beloved YF-102A, which now looks a lot better than it did. But, unfortunately, a lot of them haven't been as lucky.
Here's a last tour of the Florence museum not long before it closed. It'll give you an idea of what it was like to be there, and it'll also give you an idea of some of the cool stuff I used to get to see. I'd like to think that, somewhere in the Great Beyond, that museum still lives, and that it's forever like it was in its glory days.
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