Personal connections to history are what make museum work so special and life-changing, and we had a doozy last week here at the museum: Leigh Terrass from Washington state contacted us a few months ago with a remarkable story about her mother, Jackie, who received her pilot’s certificate in 1936

On Saturday, September 21st, the Kelch Aviation Museum’s board vice president, Kent McMakin, was awarded the Charles Taylor Master Mechanic Award for 50 years of outstanding work as an aviation mechanic. If you know Kent, you know he doesn’t like parties, so we kept it a secret until he walked

A story that spans nearly a hundred years, thousands of miles, and one small handmade airplane. This is the stuff of vintage homebuilt aviation dreams: Then: The early 1930s, Canada. Two young Chinese-Canadian brothers who caught the flying bug but had only depression-era resources. What to do? Build a Pietenpol,

The Cessna 120/140 Association is holding their annual convention at Poplar Grove Airport in Illinois, just a few miles away from us. The museum is one of the stops on their Poker Run, so we have seen a nonstop flow of these nice little historic airplanes from the 1940s today.

If you’ve seen the giant mural in downtown Brodhead, heading south on Highway 11, the car in the middle of the painting is Stan & Selma Knight’s 1940 Buick Roadmaster, delivered from the factory with all the available options. That car is currently on loan to the Kelch Aviation Museum

This week, we received a large donation of vintage aviation books from aviation historian Lynn Towns of Holt, Michigan. This wonderful collection will join our existing library in the museum’s Rudy Kopp Memorial Library & Archive once everything is inventoried and catalogued. Thank you, Lynn!Want to donate to the upkeep

The museum hosted visitors from all around the world last weekend, and we took advantage of an appearance by Cam Harrod of Ontario, renowned pilot and restorer of Fleet airplanes. Our Fleet Model 7 had new brakes installed last month, and needed a good taxi test from an experienced pilot

The Kelch Aviation Museum’s 1937 Pietenpol with a Ford Model A engine in flight on July 20th during the annual Brodhead Airport Pietenpol fly-in. This is the definition of “low and slow” flight and Great Depression-era ingenuity; powered by an automobile engine and built out of wood, Pietenpols are the

We’ve got a fly market going at the museum’s south end hangar #56 at Brodhead Airport this weekend! Stop by for original WWII era instruments, aircraft pieces and parts, and lots of rare antique aviation surprises. Running today until 5pm – and again September 6 & 7th. Stop by on