Ghost planes and ghost stories to be part of aviation museum’s new future

Ghost stories of Wichita’s old historic airport terminal and viewings of “ghost airplanes” that nobody ever sees are part of the Kansas Aviation Museum’s new slate of offerings as it sets out to chart a new future.

Starting next week, the museum, which has been going through a re-evaluation following modernizations and changes in leadership, will again be open every day except Monday. Hours will be 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. Tuesdays through Fridays and Sundays, and 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Saturdays.

The museum announced new events Friday, along with reservation-only opportunities to eat at the highest point in Wichita and to take after-hours paranormal tours with interim director and former long-term director Lon Smith.

The emphasis on ghosts is all too natural in the building at 3350 George Washington Blvd., built as Wichita’s airport terminal in the 1930s and 1940s and now listed on the National Register of Historic Places.

“There’s been some really strange things that have happened,” Smith said.

We’ll get to one of them in a minute.

All the new events and visits will take place in comfort following upgrades to the heating and cooling and to the rest rooms in the building. An elevator has been added.

Renovations were finished last July, but “there’s been nobody on board who really took advantage of the fact that they are complete,” said Smith, who has just returned to the museum as interim director after serving as director for seven years in a previous stint.

“Many times ... I had to tell families with a children in a wheelchair that they could not see the balance of the museum” because of lack of access, Smith said. “That’s no longer the case. And we have ADA-compliant restrooms.”

Ghost planes

The first special event will be Ghost Planes of the KAM on Aug. 20. It will feature around 10 exhibit-ready planes in the artifact area. “The only two that have been on exhibit are the Pretty Prairie Special and the Navy Stearman trainer,” but even those haven’t been seen for four or five years at the museum, Smith said. “There are some planes that people have never seen.”

Another new event, Ghosts of the KAM, will take place Oct. 20. Chairs will be set up in the atrium, and, by candlelight, Smith will tell ghost stories along with the history of the building.

At other times, when he gets reservations for groups of 10 or more, Smith will lead twilight paranormal tours of the museum for $25 a person. He’s done a few already — “not nearly enough” — and says they’re “really fun, because I give them a tour of the museum, and as we’re doing the tour and talking about aviation, I say, ‘Let me tell you about what happened right here.’ ”

Are you ready for one of his ghost stories?

“I’d completed an event here one night, and it was about 2 in the morning, and I shut everything off, all the lights and everything, and left the building and drove away.

“I got about half a mile down the street, and my cell phone rang, and it was the fax machine from the museum calling me, which was very odd, because I was the last person in the building.

“So I came back to the office — there was nobody here — and I picked up the receiver. It was dead. There was no tone.

“It was then I remembered the guys who were putting in a new phone system had unplugged it, and it wasn’t even plugged into the wall.”

Smith was a bit scared after the phantom call, as he usually is when these things happen, but he tries to shrug it off. Except for one time, when he was at the museum alone, painting. That time, after what happened, “I put everything away and left.” You’ll have to go to the museum to hear Smith tell what transpired.

Other events

Other museum events announced Friday:

▪ Starliner Custom Car Show on Sept. 10 will be the eighth year to have cars set up among the bombers and fighters on the museum’s ramp.

▪ Celebration KAM on Nov. 3 will take the place of a former gala and will be more of a stand-up event with various activities, “just a fun evening.”

▪ On New Year’s Eve, there will be Kids’ Year Eve, when parents can leave their children at 8 p.m. for the night at the museum.

▪ The museum sits at the highest spot in Wichita, and the control tower gives an unsurpassed view. For a minimum donation of $800 for four people, Smith will cook and serve dinner and serenade diners in the tower.

“It’s really amazing,” Smith said, “the sunset view of the city, during the the day and at night. And I’m no slouch in the kitchen.”

The museum can also be rented for weddings, wedding receptions, corporate events and picnics.

“We have 23 events on the books so far this year – not as many as we would like, but we’ll get there,” he said.

Admission to the museum is $9.50 for adults, $7.50 for children ages 4 to 12, $8.50 for seniors, and free for ages 3 and under.

The museum’s website is kansasaviationmuseum.org, and it also has a Facebook page.

This story was originally published June 10, 2016 at 3:48 PM with the headline "Ghost planes and ghost stories to be part of aviation museum’s new future."