4 ms·

1940 Air Terminal Museum Begins Liquidation

137 points by weaponeer 5mo ago

sublinear 5mo ago
Museum photos caption: "asdfsd"
dtagames 5mo ago
I had no idea this closed and I've lived here for six years! I can't believe I didn't go visit. Surely there is enough money in this city of Houston between airlines that operate here and the oil companies that they spend most of your ticket money on to keep this open?
- ljoshua 5mo ago
  It really was/is a gem of a museum, very fun to visit and quite approachable. We went a couple times, once when they had some fly-ins that made it extra special. Hopefully it can be preserved and continue it's life! There is hope: https://www.1940airterminal.org/news/texas-historical-commission-assessment https://www.1940airterminal.org/news/texas-historical-commis...
  - MichaelZuo 5mo ago
    I don’t see why they couldn’t make ends meet with events and so on. There shouldn’t be any huge expenses, unless they were leasing the premises at market rate.
- underlipton 5mo ago
  We're in a silent recession, dude. Public good's about to get sold off to monied interests for their private use, like it always is.
system2 5mo ago
20k is not bad for an airplane geek. I wish I had space for these.
- ChoGGi 5mo ago
  Plus transportation Me too :(
SoftTalker 5mo ago
The rack in this image appears to house a Texas Instruments minicomputer of some model, not sure exactly which. 980 maybe? Might be fun to play with, but not for $20K. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5e52f79c0260e664b9064208/1779425150570-FHJFLSRYGD3RD8AUCK11/PXL_20260516_194445628.RAW-01.jpg https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5e52f79c0260e6... Note the 8" floppy disk drives also.
- badc0ffee 5mo ago
  Usagi Electric is in Texas. He could make use of that thing.
  - theodric 5mo ago
    We don't need to provide one man with every computer made before 1975. The rest of us would also like to have a chance to play with them.
- bilegeek 5mo ago
  Looks like a 980B. Pic from a DC-8 sim for reference. https://i.imgur.com/b3py96N.jpeg https://i.imgur.com/b3py96N.jpeg https://imgur.com/gallery/dc-8-simulator-xY7eS https://imgur.com/gallery/dc-8-simulator-xY7eS
- arjie 5mo ago
  Getting it working would probably be a massive challenge since it’s missing parts.
- nsxwolf 5mo ago
  The 980 was used as the CPU in the Evans and Sutherland Novoview graphics system, part of a flight simulator.
  - budman1 5mo ago
    The E and S rack was an 'image generator'. That one was called an SP1. I fondly remember the SP3T as being the pinnacle of that series; the T meant "texture processing". image a computer display made up of 1000 line segments. that is what you would get. it was possible to buy these with an output that was not raster, rather it drew on the CRT with vector segments. incredible light points to simulate night landings.
stdbrouw 5mo ago
Side note: what a stunning art deco (?) building! (There's a photo on the front page of the site.)
- macintux 5mo ago
  To anyone for whom Houston is a bit too far of a drive (plus the fact that the museum now seems closed), but Cincinnati is not: Union Terminal is another beautiful example of art deco. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cincinnati_Union_Terminal https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cincinnati_Union_Terminal I spent hours photographing in there last summer. Free tours available which will take you into some of the back offices with more art deco goodness.
  - EvanAnderson 5mo ago
    Fellow Union Terminal aficionado here. Also highly recommend to any art deco architecture lovers. Even if you're not into art deco architecture it's worth a visit. The Omnimax theatre is worth the trip alone, but the museums are great too. @macintux - It's hard to get on the tour because they sell out, and they don't allow photography, but the high steel tour, which includes walking up to the top of the inside of the half dome, is great. There's some duplication with the behind the scenes tour but it's still worth it. It's probably second to the (now discontinued for liability reasons) Cincinnati subway tour in terms of seeing cool hidden stuff in the Cincinnati area.
  - jrumbut 5mo ago
    And for anyone who says "hey that looks familiar, but I've never been to Cincinnati" it was the inspiration for Justice League headquarters.
- Lammy 5mo ago
  I would call that Deco, yeah. My rule of thumb: - vertical lines == Deco - horizontal lines == Streamline (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Streamline_Moderne https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Streamline_Moderne)
skyblock500 5mo ago
I believe that if we all collectively lowball them, they will drop the price to be lower than $20k. It is unfortunate to see any museum close. I hope their assessment from the Texas Historical Commission succeeds!
- convolvatron 5mo ago
  that's seriously not the issue. if you look at the those pictures of the 737 frame - this is very large system which hasn't operated for many years and is largely just a pile of components at this point. it would probably be easier to rebuild the control system from scratch than try to bring it back to life. this would probably take a team of pretty serious people many years to get functional.
  - skyblock500 4mo ago
    Everyone needs a hobby.
rationalist 5mo ago
I have been to this museum, it is nice. If anyone can support it, please look into it and do so. Thank you.
captainregex 5mo ago
wow, this blows on so many levels.
hex4def6 5mo ago
https://www.flickr.com/photos/blairmc99/55275010559/in/photostream/ https://www.flickr.com/photos/blairmc99/55275010559/in/photo... I don't think I've ever seen a manual that expected me to use DeMorgan's Theorem as part of a test procedure... :)
- budman1 5mo ago
  what you have there is a coding sheet for a GP4. a stored program computer, with drum memory. eventually, the company would call that a 'system design and mechanization report', which would document the math and equations needed to correctly simulate a small part of an aircraft. note the marking "link division of general precision". the computer was made by General Precision, of which the Link aviation company was the biggest customer. i had always been told that Link purchased General Precision, but perhaps it was the other way around. i worked in this industry for about 35 years. this stuff was ancient and forgotten about when I started.
adolph 5mo ago
This is really sad. I was hopeful the Lone Star Flight Museum would take it over. I spent a few afternoons there with my then much smaller kids. It was a not overdone museum where you could explore around inside the vehicles like a Sikorsky S-34 and the not-working simulators.
Lammy 5mo ago
Context: https://www.1940airterminal.org/news/hahs-letter-to-city-of-houston-amp-thc https://www.1940airterminal.org/news/hahs-letter-to-city-of-... > At this moment, HAHS is in default of the lease, and must vacate both the terminal building and the 1928 hangar by the end of June. Sad :(
dark-star 5mo ago
I would love to see someone on CuriousMarc's, TubeTime's or Usagi's level of dedication get all that and rebuild/reconstruct it. Maybe if all the technology geeks of YouTube got together they could reconstruct one of those to a working level. The 737 one looks like it still has most of the components....

137 points by weaponeer 5mo ago

Museum photos caption: "asdfsd"

I had no idea this closed and I've lived here for six years! I can't believe I didn't go visit. Surely there is enough money in this city of Houston between airlines that operate here and the oil companies that they spend most of your ticket money on to keep this open?

ljoshua 5mo ago
It really was/is a gem of a museum, very fun to visit and quite approachable. We went a couple times, once when they had some fly-ins that made it extra special. Hopefully it can be preserved and continue it's life! There is hope: https://www.1940airterminal.org/news/texas-historical-commission-assessment https://www.1940airterminal.org/news/texas-historical-commis...
- MichaelZuo 5mo ago
  I don’t see why they couldn’t make ends meet with events and so on. There shouldn’t be any huge expenses, unless they were leasing the premises at market rate.
underlipton 5mo ago
We're in a silent recession, dude. Public good's about to get sold off to monied interests for their private use, like it always is.

system2 5mo ago

20k is not bad for an airplane geek. I wish I had space for these.

ChoGGi 5mo ago
Plus transportation Me too :(

SoftTalker 5mo ago

The rack in this image appears to house a Texas Instruments minicomputer of some model, not sure exactly which. 980 maybe? Might be fun to play with, but not for $20K. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5e52f79c0260e664b9064208/1779425150570-FHJFLSRYGD3RD8AUCK11/PXL_20260516_194445628.RAW-01.jpg https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5e52f79c0260e6... Note the 8" floppy disk drives also.

badc0ffee 5mo ago
Usagi Electric is in Texas. He could make use of that thing.
- theodric 5mo ago
  We don't need to provide one man with every computer made before 1975. The rest of us would also like to have a chance to play with them.
bilegeek 5mo ago
Looks like a 980B. Pic from a DC-8 sim for reference. https://i.imgur.com/b3py96N.jpeg https://i.imgur.com/b3py96N.jpeg https://imgur.com/gallery/dc-8-simulator-xY7eS https://imgur.com/gallery/dc-8-simulator-xY7eS
arjie 5mo ago
Getting it working would probably be a massive challenge since it’s missing parts.
nsxwolf 5mo ago
The 980 was used as the CPU in the Evans and Sutherland Novoview graphics system, part of a flight simulator.
- budman1 5mo ago
  The E and S rack was an 'image generator'. That one was called an SP1. I fondly remember the SP3T as being the pinnacle of that series; the T meant "texture processing". image a computer display made up of 1000 line segments. that is what you would get. it was possible to buy these with an output that was not raster, rather it drew on the CRT with vector segments. incredible light points to simulate night landings.

stdbrouw 5mo ago

Side note: what a stunning art deco (?) building! (There's a photo on the front page of the site.)

macintux 5mo ago
To anyone for whom Houston is a bit too far of a drive (plus the fact that the museum now seems closed), but Cincinnati is not: Union Terminal is another beautiful example of art deco. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cincinnati_Union_Terminal https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cincinnati_Union_Terminal I spent hours photographing in there last summer. Free tours available which will take you into some of the back offices with more art deco goodness.
- EvanAnderson 5mo ago
  Fellow Union Terminal aficionado here. Also highly recommend to any art deco architecture lovers. Even if you're not into art deco architecture it's worth a visit. The Omnimax theatre is worth the trip alone, but the museums are great too. @macintux - It's hard to get on the tour because they sell out, and they don't allow photography, but the high steel tour, which includes walking up to the top of the inside of the half dome, is great. There's some duplication with the behind the scenes tour but it's still worth it. It's probably second to the (now discontinued for liability reasons) Cincinnati subway tour in terms of seeing cool hidden stuff in the Cincinnati area.
- jrumbut 5mo ago
  And for anyone who says "hey that looks familiar, but I've never been to Cincinnati" it was the inspiration for Justice League headquarters.
Lammy 5mo ago
I would call that Deco, yeah. My rule of thumb: - vertical lines == Deco - horizontal lines == Streamline (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Streamline_Moderne https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Streamline_Moderne)

skyblock500 5mo ago

I believe that if we all collectively lowball them, they will drop the price to be lower than $20k. It is unfortunate to see any museum close. I hope their assessment from the Texas Historical Commission succeeds!

convolvatron 5mo ago
that's seriously not the issue. if you look at the those pictures of the 737 frame - this is very large system which hasn't operated for many years and is largely just a pile of components at this point. it would probably be easier to rebuild the control system from scratch than try to bring it back to life. this would probably take a team of pretty serious people many years to get functional.
- skyblock500 4mo ago
  Everyone needs a hobby.

rationalist 5mo ago

I have been to this museum, it is nice. If anyone can support it, please look into it and do so. Thank you.

captainregex 5mo ago

wow, this blows on so many levels.

hex4def6 5mo ago

https://www.flickr.com/photos/blairmc99/55275010559/in/photostream/ https://www.flickr.com/photos/blairmc99/55275010559/in/photo... I don't think I've ever seen a manual that expected me to use DeMorgan's Theorem as part of a test procedure... :)

budman1 5mo ago
what you have there is a coding sheet for a GP4. a stored program computer, with drum memory. eventually, the company would call that a 'system design and mechanization report', which would document the math and equations needed to correctly simulate a small part of an aircraft. note the marking "link division of general precision". the computer was made by General Precision, of which the Link aviation company was the biggest customer. i had always been told that Link purchased General Precision, but perhaps it was the other way around. i worked in this industry for about 35 years. this stuff was ancient and forgotten about when I started.

adolph 5mo ago

This is really sad. I was hopeful the Lone Star Flight Museum would take it over. I spent a few afternoons there with my then much smaller kids. It was a not overdone museum where you could explore around inside the vehicles like a Sikorsky S-34 and the not-working simulators.

Lammy 5mo ago

Context: https://www.1940airterminal.org/news/hahs-letter-to-city-of-houston-amp-thc https://www.1940airterminal.org/news/hahs-letter-to-city-of-... > At this moment, HAHS is in default of the lease, and must vacate both the terminal building and the 1928 hangar by the end of June. Sad :(

dark-star 5mo ago

I would love to see someone on CuriousMarc's, TubeTime's or Usagi's level of dedication get all that and rebuild/reconstruct it. Maybe if all the technology geeks of YouTube got together they could reconstruct one of those to a working level. The 737 one looks like it still has most of the components....