The National Museum of the United States Air Force located at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base near Dayton, Ohio, is the service's national institution for preserving and presenting the Air Force story. Each year more than one million visitors come to the museum to learn about the mission, history and evolving capabilities of America's Air Force.

The museum is the world's largest and oldest military aviation museum featuring more than 360 aerospace vehicles and missiles on display amid more than 17 acres of indoor exhibit space. Thousands of personal artifacts, photographs and documents further highlight the people and events that comprise the Air Force storyline, from the beginnings of military flight to today's war on terrorism.

The museum's galleries present many rare and one-of-a-kind aircraft and aerospace vehicles and thousands of historical items that chronicle the evolution of military flight from the Wright brothers to today's stealth aircraft. Sensory-rich exhibits, featuring mannequins, artifacts, sound effects and theatrical lighting, place aircraft in context and bring history to life by dramatizing and personalizing the events depicted. Visitors walking through the museum can view multiple galleries focusing on the various eras of military aviation and Air Force history, including the early years, World War I, World War II, Korea, Southeast Asia, the Cold War and the present.

A number of popular and historically significant aircraft headline the museum's growing collection. Particularly noteworthy aircraft from the early years include a rare SPAD XIII, Caproni CA 36 bomber and an MB-2 bomber. The World War II collection includes the B-29 Bockscar that dropped the atomic bomb on Nagasaki, along with a P-51 and Japanese Zero. The F-86 and MiG-15 help represent the Korean War, with the F-4 among Vietnam standouts.

Modern favorites include the B-52, B-1, F-15, F-16, F-117 stealth fighter, the Predator, Reaper and Global Hawk remotely piloted aircraft, the F-22A Raptor and the world's only permanent public exhibit of a B-2 stealth bomber.

The museum features a world-class collection of presidential aircraft, including SAM (Special Air Mission) 26000, a Boeing VC-137C that served as President John F. Kennedy's Air Force One.

The National Museum of the United States Air Force collects, researches, conserves, interprets and presents the Air Force's history, heritage and traditions, as well as today's mission to fly, fight and win ... in Air, Space and Cyberspace to a global audience through engaging exhibits, educational outreach, special programs, and the stewardship of the national historic collection. These statutory duties delegated by the Secretary of the Air Force are accomplished on behalf of the American people. We are the keepers of their stories.

The National Museum of the United States Air Force traces its birth to 1923 at McCook Field near Dayton; it moved to Wright Field in 1927. The museum closed from 1940 to 1955 due to urgent need for administrative space to support the war effort.

In 1960 local interest in aviation history led to the creation of the Air Force Museum Foundation, Inc., to secure funds for the museum. A nationwide fund-raising campaign resulted in the construction of a new $6.5 million facility in the late 1960s, with President Richard Nixon dedicating the new building in September 1971. In 1976 the foundation donated a $1 million addition to the building, and in 1988 the foundation and federal government funded equally a major $10.8 million expansion. The IMAX Theatre and atrium, a $7.3 million project funded by the foundation, opened in 1991. In 2003 the museum opened the $22.3 million, 200,000 square-foot Eugene W. Kettering Cold War Gallery. The third building is the centerpiece of a major, multi-phase expansion. The latest addition, a $3.4 million Missile and Space Gallery constructed as a missile silo, opened in 2004.