The National Museum of the United States Air Force at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base near Dayton, Ohio, is the Air Force’s official museum and the world’s largest and oldest military aviation museum. Its galleries hold more than 350 aerospace vehicles and missiles displayed across more than 19 acres of indoor exhibit space, along with thousands of artifacts, photographs and documents that trace the history of military flight from the earliest days of aviation to the modern era.
The collection includes many of the museum’s best-known aircraft, among them the B-17 Memphis Belle, the B-29 Bockscar, the only remaining XB-70 Valkyrie, and the world’s only permanent public display of a B-2 stealth bomber. Other galleries focus on World War I, World War II, Korea, Southeast Asia, the Cold War, presidential aircraft, research and development, global airlift and space.
The museum traces its origins to 1923 at McCook Field near Dayton and moved to Wright Field in 1927. Its present-day complex grew over decades, with major additions opening in 1971, 1976, 1988, 2003, 2004 and 2016. Today, it remains one of Ohio’s best-known museums and one of the country’s most significant aviation history sites.