Museum Takes Stealth Flight

By Elizabeth Schneider

August 14 -- The City is struggling to keep a large piece of its history from flying the coop, but the Museum of Flying has shown no interest in staying in the beachside town it has called home for more than a quarter century.

The museum's announcement last month that it was closing it's doors forever and possibly leaving the Santa Monica Airport for digs in Oxnard came as a surprise to many city officials.

"They [the museum] didn't consult with us before they decided to make the move," Councilman Richard Bloom said. "We didn't have the remotest inkling that this might happen."

So far, Bloom said, the museum has shown "no interest in staying in Santa Monica."

Which is unfortunate given the role Douglas Aircraft Corporation had in shaping the city of Santa Monica, said Airport Manager Bob Trimborn.

"[Douglas Aircraft Corporation] changed Santa Monica from a sleepy beachside community into a thriving blue collar city, and the museum reflected that history," said Trimborn.

The apartments and homes built to house the 40,000 Douglas employees and their families remained behind after the company closed up shop in the late 70s. So did the businesses that served them. Those apartments, Trimborn said, were the genesis of the renters rights movement.

Currently the city is trying to convince David Price, owner of the Super Marine Complex where the museum is housed, to keep "if not all but most of the museums relics in the city where it all began," said Trimborn.

"We're actively working with [Mr. Price] and trying to convince him [of that]."

In a press release announcing its closure, the museum's executive director Dan Ryan wrote that "a number of factors have prompted the relocation decision including unsuitability of the Santa Monica Airport as base for flying World War II warbirds."

Ryan said he had "no official comment at this time" regarding the Museum's relocation or current talks with city officials.

The museum's lease with Super Marine doesn't expire until 2015, but according to Trimborn that same lease "provides for a closure of the museum if the board of the museum votes unanimously to close it."

President and CEO of the Santa Monica Historical Society Louise Gabriel is also trying her hand at keeping the museum grounded.

"The Museum of Flying, is today, the only resource for our community, children and schools to participate in fully and completely understand how much of an impact Donald Douglas Sr. and his love for aviation has made on the City of Santa Monica," Gabriel wrote in a letter to the city.

"Donald Douglas put Santa Monica on the Map," she said.

The letter from the Historical Society, Bloom said, was well intended.

"We would like to see if we could find a way to keep the museum here, but on a practical note I don't know if it's possible," he said.