December 8, 2000

Museum of Flight buys plane collection

TUKWILA (AP) -- The Museum of Flight will purchase a premier collection of military fighter planes.

The Boeing Field-based private museum will buy the Champlin Fighter Collection, now housed at a museum in Mesa, Ariz.

The collection includes 25 planes, such as a World War 1 Sopwith F.1 Camel and a World War II Lockheed P-38. Doug Champlin, an Oklahoma oilman who lives in Lake Tahoe, Calif., has spent three decades collecting the aircraft from across the world. He said he is "sorry to let go of this significant part of my life." But he called the Museum of Flight "a mature organization with a quality staff who will maintain the artifacts and preserve the library and archives that accompany them."

The nonprofit museum described the purchase as a "multimillion-dollar deal" but did not specify a figure. It is using private money to buy the collection.

The planes will remain in Mesa for three years or so while the museum figures out where to house them. The museum already has many prized possessions in storage because there is no place to display them at the Red Barn, the Boeing Co.'s original building, or in the museum's Great Gallery.

The museum's board of directors is in the early stages of planning a campaign to raise $100 million for an expansion that would double the museum's size, to about 500,000 square feet.

Previous columns:

• Make tracks to the Westin, 12-01-2000
• Yellowstone, Grand Teton to ban snowmobiles, 12-01-2000
• Good news for the planning-impaired, 12-01-2000
• Learn Northwest TV history at MOHAI, 12-01-2000
• Buffalo at the airport? You herd it here, 12-01-2000
• B.C. ski resorts take top billing, 12-01-2000
• Bellingham diner has gone to the dogs, 11-17-2000
• Dahlia Lounge hosts 'A Chef and his Cookbook', 11-17-2000