Some Gave All: Musee de la Grande Guerre, Meaux France

Some Gave All: Musee de la Grande Guerre, Meaux France:

Thursday, December 6, 2018

Musee de la Grande Guerre, Meaux France

These are scenes from Meaux's Musee de la Grande Guerre, a museum dedicated to the topic of World War One.  The displays here are really impressive.

All photos are MKTH photographs.

This museum  has a fine display of weapons, including artillery.

An example of French uniforms early in the war.  Note the red trousers and the dark blue jacket.

An example of the type of uniforms the Germans wore prior to World War One. The coat is a "Prussian Blue" service coat with red flashing.  The helmet is the classic German "Pickelhaube" that survived into the early years of the war.

A panting commemorating the alliance between republican France and Imperial Russia.

Imperial Russian flag in Russian and French, for those units that served on the Western Front.

Example of early semi automatic pistols.

Display of British uniform.

British uniforms.

German uniforms.

French helmet, top, outfitted with net.  German M16 helmet below, with painted camouflage.

Ship camouflage.

French armor, and primitive trench club.

German armor.

Early helmets.

Trench hand to hand weapons, including entrenching tools.

Light machine guns, Lewis top, Chauchat bottom.

Small arms of the Great War.

French cavalryman's armor. Early in the war, things remained very 19th Century for awhile.

Horizontal stabilizer of a French airplane.

Signalling flag.

Early airborne ordinance.

French winter uniform.

French uniforms.

Russian uniform.

British uniform.

French uniform on left, German on right.

German helmet pierced by a projectile.

French helmet likewise pierced.

Travelling Communion set.

British desert uniform.

German uniform for African troops in Africa.

Gurkha kukri.

U.S. handguns.

Display of American weapons.

Trench mortar.

Lex Anteinternet: November 23, 1918. Marching into turmoil

November 23, 1918. Marching into turmoil

Army Air Service School, Rockwell Field, San Diego.  Trained pilots who wouldn't be going to Europe.

Lex Anteinternet: November 18, 1918. Allies March on the Rhine and ...

November 18, 1918. Allies March on the Rhine and the Impact of the Loss of the War Stars More Fully In Germany

Photograph taken on November 18, 1918.

Particularly if you hang out in areas of the net where the things are somewhat pedantic, you'll see the claim that World War One "didn't end" on November 11, 1918, because the Versailles Treaty was signed in May, 1919.

Cheyenne newspaper noting the American and Allied march into Germany and the surrender of the German fleet.  This paper also notes the horrible death toll of the Spanish Flu Epidemic.

Well, dear reader, armies don't march into the "heart" of a nation that isn't defeated.  Nor does a non defeated nation, in a time of war, turn its ships over to the enemy.

Laramie newspaper noting much the same, but also noting one of the ways in which wars change things. . . air mail was expanding following the close of the war. . . and of course the war had changed airplanes much.

No, while you'll occasionally see that, it's clear German was not only on its knees in November 1918, it was a defeated nation in Revolution.

The Casper paper ran as its headline the reunification of Alsace with France. . .something that a defeated nation does is give up territory.

And Germany was getting smaller, as this headline noted.

Today In Wyoming's History: November 1

Today In Wyoming's History: November 1:

November 1

November is Aviation History Month.

November 27, 2017

National Aviation History Month

Somehow I managed to miss the fact that November is National Aviation History Month.

Something that would have fit in well as a topic here on our blog.

Lex Anteinternet: October 31, 1968 Peace talks, bombing halts, . . .

October 31, 1968 Peace talks, bombing halts, UFOs, and elections.

1.  Lyndon Johnson announced that actions over North Vietnam would cease the following day, citing progress in the Paris Peace talks.  Air operations had been going on over North Vietnam since 1965.

 F-105s bombing and being lead by a B-66.

Lex Anteinternet: October 24, 1968. The last flight of the X-15

Lex Anteinternet: October 24, 1968. The last flight of the X-15:

October 24, 1968. The last flight of the X-15

The final flight of the fastest airplane ever built, the rocket propelled X-15, took place on this day, with the plane achieving Mach 5.38.

The North American X-15.

The plane was piloted by NASA pilot William Dana. NASA's logo can be seen on the side of the plane's fuselage in the photograph above.  The plane achieved altitudes of 50 miles high in some flights, qualifying the pilots of those flights for astronaut wings as the flights technically achieved space flight.

Blog Mirror: Airport board partners with development firm to attract unmanned aircraft businesses

From the Laramie Boomerang about their airport:

Airport board partners with development firm to attract unmanned aircraft businesses

Frankly, I have a really hard time getting excited about something like this.

Railhead: Blog Mirror: Lost Rail

Railhead: Blog Mirror: Lost Rail

I honestly thought I had posted a link on the side bar here to Lost Rail.

I hadn't.

My failure to do so is absolutely inexcusable.  Lost Rail is art, both visually and in terms of the beautiful writing that it features.

Well, I corrected my oversight, but it's an inexcusable omission.

If you are going to check out one railroad blog, check out Lost Rail. 
If its a contest between this one, and that one, it's no contest.  Lost Rail is great.

Boeing E-6 Mercury, Natrona County International Airport.

This is a U.S. Navy Boeing E-6 Mercury at the Natrona County International Airport.

The Mercury is an electronics command and relay aircraft that's associated with ballistic submarines.  In other words, it has a role in communications for the nation's nuclear arsenal.  It's based on Boeing's 707.

Fire Bombing Air Tractor AT-802s at the Natrona County International Airport

A common summer site in the Rocky Mountain states.

Today In Wyoming's History: September 12

Today In Wyoming's History: September 12: 1925   Beacon light construction for Rock Springs to Salt Lake City air route begins.  Attribution:  Wyoming State Historical Society.