Prehistory For many years, decommissioned aircraft from the Air Force were scrapped due to lack of space, with only a few individual parts such as engines, instruments, weapons and propellers being kept. Parts of foreign aircraft that landed in Switzerland during the Second World War, especially engines, were also kept at various departments. However, entire aircraft were usually not preserved until 1965. During the
Second World War, however, a depot was set up in
Schadau Castle in which historical material was collected for a possible but never realized army museum. After the war, some of the material supplied by the directorate of the military airfields was returned to their operations, while other parts went to various armories. The hangar manager in
Dübendorf tried to make room, and some of the engines also went to the
Technorama association's collection in
Oberwinterthur and to the mechanical engineering laboratory of the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in
Zurich. In 1970, the Department of Military Airfields donated a portion of the material suitable for a civilian museum to the
Transport Museum in Lucerne, as a contribution to the newly opened aviation hall there. Aircraft were also loaned to Lucerne. For this occasion, the then director of the Federal Office of Military Airfields, Hans Giger, decided to bring together the material that was scattered across many locations and had a World War I hangar at Dübendorf airfield that was used by the grounds service cleared in order to store the existing material. This hangar 13 was the scene of a first internal tour in 1972. Even after his retirement, Hans Giger continued to work on replicas of historic aircraft on a private basis; he recruited other retired employees of the military airfield department in Interlaken and Buochs to work on such replicas. Depending on the source, replicas were produced in between 45,500 and 60,000 hours of work, up until the time when parts of the workshops were closed in 1998, when the average age of the employees building the DH-1 replica had reached 84 years. As early as 2001, there were fears that the DH-3 aircraft project would not be completed, although later there was still hope that it would be completed. In 1978, for the first time, the public were able to contribute to the collection, which grew steadily over the next few years. Finally, in 1979, the Friends of the Museum of the Swiss air force (VFMF) was formed, initiated by Hans Giger, the Director of the Federal Office for military airfields. In order to be able to continue operations independently of the federal government, Giger suggested the establishment of a private sponsoring association, which was founded in 1979 as the Association of
Friends of the Swiss Air Force Museum (VFMF). During the VFMF presidency of former Federal Councillor Rudolf Friedrich from 1985 to 1988, the association built a new exhibition hall with the help of donations. This extension, a concrete shell structure by the engineer Heinz Isler, was inaugurated in 1988 by the then Federal Councillor Arnold Koller. The items on loan from the Lucerne Museum of Transport and other stored aircraft now found space in the museum. A year earlier, the federal government had assumed financial responsibility for the operation of the museum. Ten years later (1997), the VFMF and the
Association of Friends of the Flab (VF-Flab) merged to form the
Association of Friends of the Swiss Air Force VFL. In 2002, a second hall was opened on the site of the small old First World War hangars. During the presidency of former Federal Councillor Rudolf Heinrich Friedrich between 1985 and 1988, the club built a new exhibition hall with the help of donations. This extension, a concrete-shell structure designed by engineer
Heinz Isler, was inaugurated in 1988 by former Federal Councillor Arnold Koller. A year earlier, the federal government took over the financial responsibility for the operation of the museum. Ten years later, in 1997, the VFMF and the Association of Friends of flab (VF-flab) merged with the Friends of the Swiss Air Force AFL. In 2002, a new hall was opened. ==Exhibits==