Willow Run, for those who've never heard of it, was the scene of one of America's greatest triumphs in World War II. In Ypsilanti, Michigan, it was the site of a huge assembly line built by Ford Motor Company to turn out B-24 Liberator bombers from a building a mile long. By May 24, 1945, nearly half of all the B-24s built had come off the lines at Willow Run. At peak, a finished bomber was coming off the line roughly one every 63 minutes, 24/7.
Here's the front end of the Collings Foundation B-24J, last one flying as far as I know. This is at the Empire State Aerosciences Musem several years ago.
The
B-24 Liberator was a heavy four-engine bomber. It was a newer, faster design than its more famous contemporary,
the B-17 Flying Fortress, and it had longer range while carrying a heavier payload as well. (The "Fort", on the other hand, had a reputation for being able to take a lot more damage.) The Liberator still holds the record as the American military aircraft with the greatest production run - 18,400 as opposed to the B-17's 12,731. (Of course, Boeing was moving on to the
B-29 Superfortress as the war progressed.)
After the war, Willow Run - which Ford had sold to the government - ended up being sold to General Motors, which used it for automotive assembly lines for many years, and then as warehouse space. The airport that was tied to factory is still present, and home of the Yankee Air Museum - and thereby hangs the tale.
Ironically, despite the thousands of B-24's that Rosie the Riveter built, only one remains today in flying condition, a B-24J owned by the Collings Foundation.
Here is a wide angle view of Witchcraft
Rear view of Witchcraft, showing the twin rudder tail, and the tail-gunner's turret.
Even more ironically, the Willow Run plant that turned out so many of them is itself about to disappear forever - unless
a fund-raising appeal by the Yankee Air Museum succeeds.
The purpose of the Save The Willow Run Bomber Plant Campaign is to mobilize the resources needed to “separate” (which means to acquire, enclose, secure and power up) roughly 175,000 square feet of the 5 million square foot former Willow Run Bomber Plant, which will eventually become the new home of the Yankee Air Museum.
Although this area is large enough to house the Yankee Air Museum, its exhibits, collections, and aircraft, it is less than 5% of the colossal, one-mile-long Willow Run Plant, which was the largest factory under one roof when it was built, and still among the largest factories in the word today.
The purchase cost of the building is generously low, but the cost involved in making “our” part of the building viable, by closing it off and recreating utilities once the rest of the building is gone, is unavoidably high. Yankee must demonstrate that it can raise the funds to make this dream a reality before we can be granted permission to purchase this portion of the plant.
The deadline is May 1, 2014; the purchase price: $8 million. Amount raised - almost $7 million. An irreplaceable part of American history is about to disappear forever. The
news video below gives some idea of what is at stake. (It also contains enough errors, it really demonstrates the need to save the history of Willow Run.)
http://youtu.be/...
The organizers have already had several postponements of the deadline - this looks like it. Willow Run is important not only because of its part in winning World War II, or because of its connection to the B-24. Willow Run is a reminder of what American Workers, including American Women can do. It's a reminder of the importance of Labor to the American economy at a time when well-financed forces are doing everything possible to minimize the role of workers, their pay, their political power, and their historical importance.
If anyone would like to contribute to save Willow Run,
the website with donation links, information, and plans for the future is here. They're happy to take any size donations (for $50 you can save a square foot!) and they take credit cards and Paypal.
For those who want a better appreciation of just what those workers accomplished back then, and what we sent our people out to fly, fight, and sometimes die in, the Collings Foundation B-24 page has links to a calendar of appearances, where you can see the last B-24 fly - and even ride in it. There's also a link to two special web pages that will let you move through a virtual 360° panoramic view of the different parts of the plane. Cut-away graphics here and here give you a choice of two different interfaces. You can chose to sit in the cockpit, the nose turret, the waist gun position, the navigator/bombardier's compartment and other areas of the plane.
Pick an area, wait for the image to load, and then position your cursor on it. Click and hold, and move your cursor left/right, up/down just a little and the image will move. Let go of the cursor, and the image will freeze where it is. While you're exploring the B-24, take time to look at all of the different components that had to be assembled into a working airplane: the struts, ribs, wires, hydraulic lines, and more. If you look carefully, you'll see the nose gunner and the navigator had to crawl under the cockpit past the nose wheel to get to their positions. Think about how hard it might be to bail out quickly from some of the cramped quarters in the plane. You'll get a much better appreciation of what it took to climb into one of those bombers and head for enemy territory with a load of bombs, bullets, and - hopefully - more than a little luck.
This is the kind of memory they hope to save at Willow Run. Let's just see if We CAN do it!