Evergreen Aviation: The Spruce Goose (Hughes H-4) (photo diary)

by Ojibwa for Kossack Air Force

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Friday, Sep. 11, 2020 Friday, Sep. 11, 2020 at 7:21:40am PDT

The Evergreen Aviation & Space Museum in McMinnville, Oregon, has about 100 aviation and space vehicles on display. Dominating the aviation museum is the huge flying boat known as the Spruce Goose. This is the world’s largest aircraft. The airplane was built between 1942 and 1947 using wood because of a government mandate not to use materials critical to the war effort, such as steel and aluminum. It was flown only once in 1947.

According to the display:

“The single hull prototype was built was a personnel and materiel carrier. The aircraft was designed to fly trans-Atlantic to avoid the World War II German submarines that were sinking Allied ships.”

While popularly known as the Spruce Goose, a name that Howard Hughes hated, the huge place is actually made out of birch, a wood that is light, strong, and resistant splitting, dry rot, and deterioration.