model aircraft – Art Blart _ art and cultural memory archive

Exhibition: ‘Model Aircraft’ at SFO Museum, San Francisco International Airport

Exhibition dates: 21st August 2020 – onwards

Modelbau Schaarschmidt, Berlin
Pan American World Airways Boeing 377 Stratocruiser model aircraft (detail)
1950s
Scale 1:72
Metal, paint, decals
SFO Museum
Gift of Constance Ogilvie

Continuing the aeronautical theme, a selection of gorgeous photographs of model aircraft from the SFO Museum, mainly details from the intricate and beautiful models. The man and the shadow he casts atop the enormous Hughes H-4 Hercules (Spruce Goose) flying boat is just delightful.

The museum is doing many fine exhibitions at the moment, including two photography exhibitions, Above the Bay: The Aerial Photography of Stanley Page and R.J. Waters: Golden Gate Park.

Upcoming exhibitions of interest are Widebody: The Launch of the Jumbo jets in the Early 1970s, also Flying the Freedom Birds: Airlines and the Vietnam War and an exhibition on Early Motorcycles (mostly 1910-1914). Of Australian interest are upcoming exhibitions around the aviator Charles Kingsford Smith.

I hope to post on all of these exhibitions in the near future.

Dr Marcus Bunyan

Many thankx to Chad Anderson and the SFO Museum for allowing me to publish the photographs in the posting. Please click on the photographs for a larger version of the image.

Installation views of the exhibition Model Aircraft at SFO Museum, San Francisco International Airport

Model aircraft play a unique role in the imagination of aviation enthusiasts of all ages. They help contextualise the heroic stories and technological triumphs of flight. In many cases, the original aircraft are lost to history, but these small-scale representations remain as a reminder of that innovative past. The processes and materials employed by model makers are as varied as the aviation industry itself. This essay of images focuses on select examples from the more than two thousand models held in the collection of SFO Museum. We hope the enlargement of details provides an opportunity to return our gaze to the art of the model makers, which can be easily overlooked when focusing on the these historical recreations.

For more exhibitions featuring material from the collection of SFO Museum, visit the nearby San Francisco Airport Commission Aviation Library and Louis A. Turpen Aviation Museum. The facility, an architectural adaptation of the Airport’s 1930s passenger lobby, is located pre-security and just minutes away on the departures level of the International Terminal. Exhibitions, research services, and educational programs are offered to the public free of charge with daily operating hours of 10.00 am to 4.30 pm, closed holidays. SFO Museum The mission of SFO Museum is to delight, engage, and inspire a global audience with programming on a broad range of subjects; to collect, preserve, interpret, and share the history of commercial aviation; and to enrich the public experience at San Francisco International Airport. SFO Museum programs more than thirty galleries throughout the terminals with a rotating schedule of art, history, science, and cultural exhibitions. To browse current and past exhibitions, research the collection, or for more information about the program, please visit the SFO Museum website.

Text from the SFO Museum

Modelbau Schaarschmidt, Berlin
Pan American World Airways Boeing 377 Stratocruiser model aircraft (detail)
1950s
Scale 1:72
Metal, paint, decals
SFO Museum
Gift of Constance Ogilvie

Pan American World Airways Boeing 377 Stratocruiser
1950s

The Boeing 377 Stratocruiser was a long range double-deck airliner that first flew on 8 July 1947. Entering service on 1 April 1949 with Pan American, it was also operated by BOAC, Northwest Orient Airlines, United Airlines and American Overseas Airlines.

Seating generally between 50 and 75 passengers, the pressurised Stratocruiser featured sleeping berths for longer flights. Just 56 aircraft were produced, with Pan Am retiring the last one in 1961.

PAN AM AIRLINES INTRODUCES THE BOEING STRATOCRUISER

Edward Chavez (1917-2004)
Granville Gee Bee Model R-1 Super Sportster model aircraft
1965
Scale 1:10
Fibreglass, balsa wood, metal, acrylic, rubber, paint
SFO Museum

Edward Chavez (1917-2004)
Granville Gee Bee Model R-1 Super Sportster model aircraft
1965
Scale 1:10
Polychrome fiberglass, balsa wood, metal, acrylic, rubber, paint
SFO Museum

Granville Gee Bee Model R-1 Super Sportster aircraft
1965

A.C. Rehberger Company, Chicago
United Air Lines Douglas DC-3 model aircraft (shield logo detail)
c. 1937
Scale 1:50
Metal, enamel, paint, plastic, decals
SFO Museum

H-4 Hercules “Spruce Goose”
November 2, 1947
Public domain

Jim Lund
Hughes H-4 Hercules (Spruce Goose) flying boat model aircraft (detail)
2002
Plastic, epoxy, resin, metal, paint
Scale 1:72
SFO Museum
Gift of Jim Lund

H-4 Hercules “Spruce Goose” on its only flight
November 2, 1947
Public domain

Jones-Bause & Company, Los Angeles
United Air Lines Douglas DC-8 cutaway model (interior detail)
Late 1950s
Scale 1:10
Metal, wood, paint, plastic, ink
SFO Museum
Gift of the Rollison Family

Modelbau Schaarschmidt, Berlin
Northwest Orient Airlines Lockheed L-1049 Super Constellation
1950
Paint, metal
Scale 1:50
SFO Museum

Modelbau Schaarschmidt, Berlin
Northwest Orient Airlines Lockheed L-1049 Super Constellation model aircraft (detail)
1950s
Paint, metal
Scale 1:50
SFO Museum

Edward Chavez (1917-2004)
U.S. Army Air Corps Boeing P-26A model aircraft
1972
Scale 1:10
Polychrome fibreglass, balsa wood, metal, acrylic, rubber, paint
SFO Museum

Edward Chavez (1917-2004)
U.S. Army Air Corps Boeing P-26A (Peashooter) model aircraft
1972
Scale 1:10
Polychrome fiberglass, balsa wood, metal, acrylic, rubber, paint
SFO Museum

Martin Čížek
Boeing P-26A Peashooter of the 34th Pursuit Squadron 17th Pursuit Group
1933-1936 (production run)
CC BY-SA 4.0

The Boeing P-26 “Peashooter” was the first American all-metal production fighter aircraft and the first pursuit monoplane to enter squadron service with the United States Army Air Corps. Designed and built by Boeing, the prototype first flew in 1932, and the type was still in use with the U.S. Army Air Corps as late as 1941 in the Philippines. There are only two surviving Peashooters, but there are three reproductions on exhibit with two more under construction.

Deliveries to USAAC pursuit squadrons began in December 1933 with the last production P-26C aircraft coming off the assembly line in 1936. Ultimately, 22 squadrons flew the Peashooter, with peak service being six squadrons, in 1936. P-26s were the frontline fighters of the USAAC until 1938, when Seversky P-35s and Curtiss P-36s began to replace the P-26. A total of twenty P-26s were lost in accidents between 1934 and America’s entry into World War II on 7 December 1941, but only five before 1940.

Text from the Wikipedia website

Pan American Airways Sikorsky S-43 Baby Clipper amphibian model aircraft (detail)
1930s
Scale 1:48
Wood, paint
SFO Museum
Gift of the Captain John B. Russell Family

Bill Larkins
Sikorsky S-43 Baby Clipper
1938
CC BY-SA 2.0

This 12-passenger amphibian was owned by William K. Vanderbilt of New York City when it was photographed at Oakland, CA, in 1938

Pan American Airways Sikorsky S-42 flying boat model aircraft (detail)
1934
Scale 1:30
Wood, metal, paint
SFO Museum

United Technologies Corporation
One-quarter left front view of Pan American Airways Sikorsky S-42 “Pan American Clipper” (r/n NR-823M; c/n 4201) in flight over San Francisco Bay on its way to Hawaii. San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge construction is visible
c. 1934
National Air and Space Museum, Smithsonian Institution
Public domain

Delivered: December 1934
Left service: August 7, 1944

West Indies Clipper. Later renamed Pan American Clipper & surveyed trans-Pacific route, then re-named Hong Kong Clipper (1937). Sank at Antilla, Cuba.

Pan American Airways Sikorsky S-42 flying boat model aircraft (detail)
1934
Scale 1:30
Wood, metal, paint
SFO Museum

SFO Museum
San Francisco International Airport
P.O. Box 8097
San Francisco, CA 94128 USA
Phone: 650.821.6700

SFO Museum website

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Exhibition: ‘Postwar Propliners in Miniature: Models from the Collection of Anthony J. Lawler’ at SFO Museum (SFOM), San Francisco International Airport

Exhibition dates: June 2011 – December 2011

Location: Aviation Museum and Library 1 – Front Wall Cases

Lockheed Aircraft Co., Burbank, California
American Overseas Airlines Lockheed L-049 Constellation
c. 1946
Scale 1:44
Metal, paint
Collection of Anthony J. Lawler

One of my favourite postings in a long while. As an inveterate collector how I would love to have these in my collection. What beautiful aircraft; what graceful models; what simple, gorgeous photographs by photographer Chad Michael Anderson. The Lockheed Constellation has to be one of the most delicious aircraft ever made. But the model I would take is the gorgeous Air France Breguet 763 Provence, because of it’s aerodynamic beauty and angle of flight.

Marcus

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Many thankx to John Hill, Assistant Director, Aviation for his help and to SFO Museum for allowing me to publish the text and the photographs. Attribution for the photographs is to the SFO Museum (actual photographer unknown). Please click on the photographs for a larger version of the image.

Maarten Matthys Verkuyl (Dutch)
KLM (Koninklijke Luchtvaart Maatschappij) Royal Dutch Airlines Douglas DC-6
c. 1950
Scale 1:48
Metal, paint
Collection of Anthony J. Lawler

Shawcraft Models, Uxbridge, England
BEA Airspeed AS.57 Ambassador
1950s
Scale 1:48
Wood, metal, paint
Collection of Anthony J. Lawler

La Maquette d’Etude et d’Exposition à Aubervilliers, France
Air France Breguet 763 Provence
1950s
Scale 1:50
Wood, plastic, metal, paint
Collection of Anthony J. Lawler

Immediately following the end of World War II in 1945, airlines and passengers benefited from a surplus of inexpensive, advanced propeller-driven transport aircraft, or “propliners.” Over the next fifteen years, commercial aviation expanded rapidly as airlines persistently requested improved propliner designs to lower costs, attract new customers, and gain advantages over competitors. In meeting these demands the manufacturers of North America and Europe developed increasingly superior aircraft. These included the jet-powered turboprop airliners that flew successively faster, higher, and farther.

Making scale models of these airliners was an important part of the design, manufacturing, and marketing process during this period. Crafted by in-house model shops or independent model makers, they represented the new designs in miniature for convenient three-dimensional analysis. Accurately painted livery schemes on the models helped the airlines to imagine the new airliner operating within their fleet. Carriers also commissioned the making of models to promote their improved services in airline offices and travel agencies. During the late 1940s and early 1950s, they were usually made of sheet or cast metal and complemented with metal bases often formed into unique streamline shapes. By the late 1950s, models began to be produced from plastic, which was easier to mold into intricate shapes and reflected the proliferation of new synthetic resins.

These models represent the age of postwar propliners, which lasted until the 1960s when faster, more fuel-efficient and propeller-less turbojet airliners began to supersede them. They are from the collection of Anthony J. Lawler, an aviation industry professional and avid airplane model collector since first seeing the De Havilland Comet – the world’s first jetliner – fly over his boyhood home in Rhodesia. Mr. Lawler has spent decades assembling one of the finest collections of scale airliner display models, most of which were acquired while working as a senior sales representative for Airbus North America during the 1980s and 1990s. His collection spans a century of commercial aviation design innovation.

Text from the SFO Museum website

Raise-Up Models, Rotterdam, Netherlands
REAL (Redes Estaduais Aéreas Limitadas) Transportes Aéreos Lockheed 1049H Super Constellation
1950s
Metal, paint
Collection of Anthony J. Lawler