Let's start with quantity, and then smoothly (hopefully) move on to quality.
The data set "Museums and Galleries" is posted on the open data portal of the Ministry of Culture of Russia. Let's use it.
To work with the set, we use the mobile application for iOS "Our Moscow". It is still the only mobile client in the App Store for various Russian open data portals.
We select the portal - Ministry of Culture in the main menu of the application, we find the set "Museums and Galleries".
We see 4445 records (objects).
Unfortunately, the set does not contain a field indicating what the museum collection is about, so it is easy to find all museums with the subject area of aviation and astronautics. Problem. We'll have to suffer.
Let's take a closer look at the set.
There is no required field, but there is a working time of each museum on all days of the week and the time zone where it is located. One day of the week - one field ... No, that won't help us either. In general, who needs this schedule? Sorry, distracted.
To select all the museums with the corresponding theme, you will have to search for all records containing the word "air"
There is a "Search" function in the application menu. Condition for searching "avia".
Found 56 properties. A good number.
We look, but in the found list, in addition to museums with the desired topic, there were others, in particular, all museums and exhibitions in which aircraft designers are simply mentioned as fellow countrymen and objects with addresses containing the word "air". That is, not all of the found aviation museum.
There is no desire to open for viewing each record found to calculate the total number of museums.
Better to look for records containing the word "space" - found 29.
The same situation as in the first case, the presence of "garbage" (not all gold that glitters).
Let's look at the intersection of the found lists.
We are trying to find all museums using the "space + air" condition. We find only three objects. Little.
In this case, only two of them are suitable for us:
- . ;
- « » ( — ) — ( , , ).
The third object has nothing to do with the purpose of the search (again "rubbish"), this is the House-Museum of the sculptor Opekushin, it is simply located on Aviatorov Avenue near the bus station "TC Cosmos" (sometimes).
That is, the amount of garbage here is 33%.
There is no desire to revise all the records found, therefore, assuming that 33% is garbage, and adding "air" plus "space" (56 + 29) Total: 83 objects.
Let's remove the "rubbish" (Taking into account the reasoning about its approximate amount) and assume that in Russia, according to the open data of the Ministry of Culture, there are about 60 museums with aerospace themes (I think I did not offend).
Now let's turn to US open data.
For this we will not search and analyze datasets, but use the application for iOS "Open COSMOS", which already uses the corresponding dataset (US museums with aviation and space themes).
In addition to the description, links to the site and the content of the exposition of each object, the application has a view of the museum from above (satellite view maps), so there is no doubt about the reliability of the information. All objects are "obvious", that is, relevant.
First, the general figure.
According to the data from the pivot table inside this application, the number of museums with aviation and space themes in the United States is more than 360 ...
Inspires ...
Let's take a closer look at them.
Out of 360 - the classic version of the museum - 295 objects.
The most interesting and largest of them (personal opinion) is the National Museum of the US Air Force.
Russian counterpart, Air Force Museum in Monino, Moscow Region. True, in terms of the number of exhibits in the collection, the museum in Monino is ten times less. Moreover, all the exhibits in the USA are under a roof, but in Russia under the snow. But more on that below.
The remaining 60 are:
- 10 (NASA Visitors Center) is a very distant, distant analogue of the Russian departmental museums of individual enterprises (behind the fence), which in turn grew in Russia from the Museums of Labor Glory (which were previously required to be at every enterprise). As an example, the departmental museum of NPO Energia.
Only in the USA these Visitors Centers are free (but paid), but it is not easy to get to the NPO Energia museum from the street. And let NASA forgive me for such a comparison (nothing better came to mind).
For example, a photo of similar objects. This is one of the buildings at the Lindson Johnson Space Center (Houston, TX):
and the John F. Kennedy Space Center (Cape Canaveral, Florida):
- 39 (Static Display) - these are real aircraft (sr-71, B-52, U-2, A-10, etc.) exhibited in parks, along roads, on the territory of military bases, etc. U-2 (Static Display):
This plane is visible on the map at the bottom of the screen:
More than one object can be set up in one parking lot. This can be seen in the previous photo at the top of it.
In Russia, there are also such, but I don't know if anyone tried to create a catalog of them or not (but there are definitely none on the open data portal, if I am mistaken, tell me).
- 9 (Storage) - storage locations for used devices. Just in storage or waiting in line for disassembly and disposal (but at the same time you can come there and look).
- Below is a photo from a similar storage location located at the Davis-Monten US Air Force Base (Tucson, Arizona)
And top view (map):
It's very easy to get here.
Come to the Pima Air and Space Museum, located in Tucson, Arizona, and buy a three-hour excursion to the airbase there (they don't care which country you come from).
- 9 (Naval Ship) - aviation museums based on naval warships - mainly aircraft carriers. There are no aircraft carriers in the form of museums in Russia at all. There are outside the country. In China ... Why not with us, I don't know ...)
As an example, the aircraft carrier "Midway" in San Diego, California:
I think everything is clear with the quantity. In the USA - 360, in Russia - 60. It looks like they have more ... Six times. We have clearly lost here.
Now let's talk about the quality of the expositions.
Most museums in the United States are private, not public.
As an example, here is a list of exhibits of a private museum in Seattle - (Museum of Flight) (Washington):
Concorde, MiG-15, MiG-17, MiG-21, Yak-9, Soyuz TMA-14, Lockheed M-21 (A-12 Blackbird), Boeing 737, Boeing 747, Boeing 787, Messerschmitt 109 and so on. (Open the museum website and take a look).
What does this mean?
- The answer: “they have nowhere to spend their money” is not suitable ... Money always has something to spend. For example, you can buy Faberge eggs.
- I think a more correct answer is that they have money and are more interested in it than purchasing Faberge eggs.
Or maybe the eggs are all already bought up, so you have to take what is left.
A considerable number of private museums consist of flying exhibits. If you want to see the MiG-17 in flight - welcome to the USA.
Here he is a handsome man with stars.
In Russia, I have not heard about this (and have not seen it) - if not right, please correct and tell where they can be seen.
In addition to the list of museums, the Open COSMOS application contains the main exhibits in each of them.
Let's look for our (but former) compatriots.
It turns out they (that is, we) are very well represented there.
In museums in the United States, you can look at:
AN-2, IL-2, IL-14, KA-26, LA-9, MiG-15, MiG-17, MiG-19, MiG-21, MiG-23, MiG-25, MiG-29, MI- 24, I-15, I-153, I-16, PO-2, SU-7, TU-2, Yak-3, Yak-9.
A worthy exposition ...
We also have something to see from them:
Douglas A-20:
Bell P-63, North American B-25, Piasecki CH-21 (helicopter) (in the Air Force Museum - Monino).
Only 4 exhibits, of which 3 belong to the period of the Great Patriotic War.
Sorry, I forgot, we also have in the Air Force Museum (Monino) a fairly exact copy of the B-29 (below the B-29 in the National Museum of the US Air Force):
and in this picture it is in Monino, already in the form of a Tu-4:
It was after this plane that Tupolev for some reason began to finish all his main developments at the number four, (Tu-104, Tu-114, Tu-124, Tu-134, Tu-144, Tu-154 ...) they say superstition to be lucky like with Tu-4 ...
Sorry to be distracted, back to the exhibits.
In US museums, there are only 8 MiG-29s (pictured at the National Museum of the US Air Force - it stands here under the B-1 wing):
MiG-15, MiG-17 and MiG-21 can not be counted.
The impression is that there are direct deliveries from Russia to the United States. As they wrote off, they immediately send it. And apparently not free.
I would also like to see in our museums, for example, the F-86, F-4, F-94, F-104, F-16 and so on. But alas, the return deliveries of their equipment to our country have not yet been established.
They are not in our museums. And they have ours. It looks like we're not the first again.
Maybe we have no problems in the field of German aviation exhibits from the times of the Great Patriotic War?
There must be trophies.
Is it possible that we are the first in this part of the historical material?
German (World War II) Messerschmitt Me.262:
Me.163:
Me.328, Bf.109, V-1 (FAU-1) missiles as usual:
and the manned version (yes there was such a - Fi-103r - Reichenberg), V-2 and even Bachem Ba 349 (it was on this device that for the first time - but unsuccessfully - an attempt was made to vertical controlled flight on a liquid-propellant rocket engine), various Heinkel options and Focke-Wulf.
Moreover, all these exhibits are not isolated, there are many of them and they are presented in various museums of the country. Moreover, some of them are in a living, flying state. They have a very, very large collection of cars from that time.
But in Russia? The Vadim Zadorozhny Museum of Technology has a German Messerschmitt Bf.109 - 1 piece.
And that's all ... It seems as if the Second World War was in North America, and not in Europe. And all the trophies went to them.
In this area, again, the comparison is not in our favor.
Now a personal look at the internal organization of museums.
She is also very different.
In our country, these are mainly platforms with signs under the exhibits.
In the United States, most of the main museums are presented in the form of expositions for periods tied to global and local conflicts (World War II - Cold War II - Korea - Vietnam - Cuba - Space Race), this is logical and understandable, and at the same time, there is some kind of or history.
Here (the US Air Force Museum in Dayton) is a story about a MiG hijacked from Korea:
In any museum, you can understand the history of the appearance of an exhibit without a guide, there is always relevant information
and a lot of additional visualization.
With us, without a guide, you just look at the hardware and read, at best, its name and the name of the chief designer.
Our main museum in Monino is structured haphazardly. (Attention - this is a personal opinion! You can argue. Very interesting.)
There are several buildings in which an attempt is made to tell about the early stages in the development of domestic aviation (not world) with a very poor exposition, several hangars with exhibits near which there are only small plates with descriptions , and a field with airplanes and helicopters aging and dying in the open air.
And in the placement on the field, again, there is no logic.
Formally, this is just a platform with technology (Static Display), come and see. But you are unlikely to learn something new. Very sorry.
And of course the complete absence of representatives of world aviation, here you are not there.
But the history of aviation, its trends, was not formed by one country, it is interesting in the full picture.
This is exactly what we do not have. Sorry.
And they have.
Here is a picture from the museum at Cape Canaveral (NASA Visitors Center):
Everything is available and Korolev and Gagarin and Soyuz under the ceiling:
We also have an Apollo (model) in the departmental museum of NPO Energia, but who saw it? (Except me. Joke.)
And that's all.
And for special exhibits, Made in USA.
They have SR-71 on display:
F-22:
F-117:
b-2:
everything is in excellent condition (as soon as it leaves the factory)
It is also interesting to place museums in the USA.
Since there are coordinates in the open data, you can look at the placement of certain groups of museums in the application.
This is how museums based on naval warships (aircraft carriers) are scattered.
Everything is logical here - along the perimeter of the country. Choose the closest one and go see.
If we talk about the current state of these ships, it is worth recalling that on September 11 just such an aircraft carrier museum (Intrepid) in New York was used as a temporary headquarters during the terrorist attack.
A museum is a museum, but as in the song it is “... our armored train. Stands on the side track! "
That is, a whole group of such armored trains is evenly distributed along the perimeter of the country.
And here are the states in which museums based on missile sites are located (Missile site). We look at the small map at the top: You
can immediately see how the strategic missile forces are located in the United States.
You want to know who and from where is looking closely at the rest of the world. Look at which sites (Static Display) U-2 and SR-71 are exhibited.
This is the CIA headquarters - here is SR-71:
and here is the military base - here are both SR-71 and a drone to it:
and to the left (on the map already in the appendix) you can see U-2. At the base itself, large drones are perfectly visible from above. A small pleasant addition to the current exposure when viewing maps from above.
Maybe that's why we don't have something like this. I looked at the placement of museums and immediately understood everything. That is, we could, but not now. Sometime later.
But since they haven't built their own, maybe it's time to start buying in the USA not only modern gadgets, but aviation museums?
Conclusion:
"Houston - we have problems."