Stefan Schmoll visits charismatic Old Rhinebeck aerodrome, home to a wonderful gathering of classics
MUSEUMS OLD RHINEBECK
British understatement against American entertainment: both have their charm. The Shuttleworth Collection at Old Warden in Bedfordshire and the Rhinebeck Aerodrome Museum north of New York are often compared. Each is located on an idyllic little grassy airfield, but at the American venue the appeal is aimed not just at the aviation enthusiast but at providing entertainment for the whole family.
After World War Two, Cole Palen became a mechanic at the commercial airport of Roosevelt Field on Long Island, New York. Languishing in one of the hangars was a small cache of aircraft from a moribund museum project. With the airfield due to close in 1951 these treasures were put up for sale.
Cole scraped all his savings together and for a reported $1,500 became the owner of an Aeromarine 39, an Avro 504, a Curtiss JN-4 ‘Jenny’, a Sopwith Snipe, a SPAD XIII and a Standard J-1. He kept the machines at the family property and began restoring and acquiring more aircraft.
In 1958 he bought a dilapidated farm surrounded by forest at Rhinebeck in the Hudson Valley, where he built some small, crude …
