In a fascinating presentation last week, Bryan Douglass told us about taking Miss Montana on a date.
The Miss Montana he was referring to is a C-47 like the ones that flew over Normandy on D-Day; the date was the 75th anniversary of that historic occasion. Miss Montana was built in 1944, but the war ended before she was able to play a part in it. After ferrying firefighters to fire locations for many years, Miss Montana now calls the Mountain Flying Museum in Missoula home.
When he heard that 14 other C-47s would be making the trip back to Normandy for the D-Day anniversary, Brian was determined to get Miss Montana there. A crew of enthusiasts raised nearly $500,000 in ten months to fund the trip, and one week after their test flight in May 2019, they left Missoula for what would be a 5-week trip.
Bryan ran video footage of the trip to dramatize the presentation and was clearly impressed by the things he saw. He described Greenland as "remote and gorgeous" and Iceland as "simply beautiful and modern and fun." When they arrived in Duxford, England, the home of an aerial war museum, the folks there were amazed. "They didn't think we'd make it !" Bryan said. Miss Montana flew over the white cliffs of Dover and, finally, over Normandy on the 75th anniversary of D-Day. President Macron and President Trump were on hand to memorialize the occasion.
Bryan was especially touched by the appreciation the people of Normandy still show for the American effort that returned France to the French. "For example, there was a bouquet of roses left on Omaha Beach," he recalled, "and written in the sand was the word 'MERCI.' They have not forgotten."
The presentation was full of interesting details about the people of Iceland, England, France and Germany and wonderful footage, including a much-bleeped clip of a female member of the crew parachuting out of the plane and scrambling to avoid some power lines. If you missed last week's meeting, you missed something really special!
