Exchange club recognizes Arne Weinman

Last month, the downtown Spokane Exchange Club honored Col. Arne Weinman with its Golden Deed Award for 2007.

Weinman was recognized for his longtime involvement in the community, primarily as the driving force behind the proposed Armed Forces and Aerospace Museum. Ground breaking is planned for the summer of 2009 at the site near Spokane International Airport.

Weinman is a man not only of action but also of vision and leadership. His military career culminated as commander of the 92nd Bombardment Wing at Fairchild Air Force Base.

Since retiring in 1991, Weinman has reinvented himself in many other roles, among them as a businessman and home builder. He has won numerous awards from the Spokane Home Builders Association.

Weinman also has built floats for the Spokane Lilac Festival-Armed Forces Torchlight Parade every year since 1999.

In 1995, the Air Force, as a cost-cutting effort, decided to close all its field museums nationwide. At that time, Fairchild had a small museum housing 7,000 artifacts.

Upon the museum’s closure, all of its artifacts would have to be sent to the Air Force Museum at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base in Ohio. But a lot of those items had been donated locally and have close ties to the Inland Northwest.

Weinman began an effort to petition the Air Force to allow those artifacts to be kept in Spokane.

In 1996, although the Air Force had not yet given a green light to the project, efforts to build a civilian museum to house and display Fairchild’s artifacts began.

A site was secured with a proposed 30-year lease in the Spokane International Airport business park. Weinman says he hopes the visibility from Interstate 90 and easy access by both air and ground will benefit the museum.

Weinman’s vision, as depicted in the architects’ design, is not only a space that displays military artifacts but also a place where military-aircraft enthusiasts and history buffs, as well as the general public, can converge and learn.

“The Air Force base used to have arrangements with 42 local schools for children to come and have a day of history,” Weinman said. “After 9/11, this program was shut down due to tightened security. We would like to continue this tradition.”

Of the $12 million needed to open the museum, a little more than $2 million has been raised, mostly from private donors.

Weinman goes to Exchange, Rotary and other clubs to spread the word. The museum also sells memberships through its Web site.

“We have the second- or third-best collection of antique military aircraft in the world that will be loaned to us for display,” Weinman said. “The museum merits as a tourist destination on that alone. It will add a lot to our community.”