All Stories

During World War I, a new form of espionage took flight—literally. Photography from aircraft was introduced as a new way to spy.

On January 30, 1942, the Army Air Corps awarded Northrop a contract to build two XP-61 prototypes. Rediscover the Northrop P-61 Black Widow aircraft in part two of the blog series.

Navy pilots recall the final, frenetic days of the air war over Vietnam.

Late in World War Two the German's developed the Heinkel He 162 Spatz, an early jet fighter part of the Volksjäger (People’s Fighter) project.

During World War II, the U.S. Navy did not have a program that allowed African Americans to train and fly as naval aviators. Jesse Leroy Brown, however, fought through many hurdles to become the first African American to complete Navy flight training. Discover his story.

Maj. Gen. Charles Bolden was NASA's first African American Administrator. He also served in the military and logged over 680 hours in space.

For more than 30 years this partnership between LSO and naval aviators remained crucial to aircraft carrier landing operations. Almost overnight this partnership changed when jet aircraft altered the calculus of a carrier landing. Soon after, the Mirror Landing System (MLS) was born.

Al Casby is not only working to restore a Vought F7U Cutlass, but its reputation as well.

The new gallery seeks to better frame the story of World War II around the idea that aviation was central to victory, and the exhibition will highlight key areas of wartime aeronautical innovation that changed the nature and experience of warfare. 

Getting all the components of a complex aircraft to fit and function satisfactorily required more than a year of careful design work, however on January 30, 1942, the Army Air Corps awarded Northrop a contract to build two XP-61 prototypes. Rediscover the Black Widow on the 80th anniversary year of its first flight.