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Calgary's first aviation museum, "The Air Museum of Canada" was founded in 1960, but was largely a collection of privately owned aircraft. Breaking up in 1971, the aircraft and museum assets were delivered to the city of Calgary and housed in the city's Planetarium for protection and display. In 1975, the Calgary "Aero Space Museum Association" was registered as a nonprofit, charitable organization, and took over the care and maintenance of these artifacts.



In the late 1970s, a central office was established. Newly retired Calgary Airport manager Bill Watts at the time agreed to run the daily operations of the museum. In 1985, the Calgary Aero Space Museum resided in the former Bullock Helicopter Hangar, at the southern end of Calgary International Airport. A former BCATP World War II training hangar, this building has housed the Museum's collection since that time.



The building in which the museum's collection is held had its origins in the founding of the British Commonwealth Air Training Program in Calgary. Built in 1941, it was the training hall for the Secondary Flight Training School.



Left vacant and unused for a postwar time, the building eventually became home to Bullock Helicopters. Bullock Helicopters conducted oil exploration, search and rescue, and transportation for seismic crews and their equipment. One of the first tasks Evan Bullock and his team undertook was to tear up the original wooden floor and pour a concrete slab in its place. Also during its lease, Bullock Helicopters built the area that currently houses the museum's gift shop. At the time, it was used as a reception area and administrative offices. As an interesting side note, museum visitors often comment on the beautiful stone wall that makes the gift shop inventory. Bullock riders would return from trips north with unusual rocks and fossils they discovered. This collection was eventually mounted on the wall of the museum's shop window.



Other companies also hung their tiles over the door, the last of which was Kenting Helicopters. After their departure in 1985, they offered museum founder Bill Watts the use of the hangar for the Aero Space Museum collection. Fortunately for the young organization, Kenting Helicopters paid rent on the building for the remainder of the year and provided the museum with the money, allowing them to rent the rent free of charge in the first months of existence. Later that year, the Calgary Airport Authority generously granted the hangar to the Aero Space Museum free of charge in perpetuity.



As the museum's collection grew, the installation had to change to keep up. In 1997, new hangar doors were installed, widening the entrance to the aircraft and allowing more of the collection to be housed indoors. This movement was the first in a series of major changes to the museum's infrastructure in the coming years.



In 1998, the former administrative offices along the museum's east wall were destroyed. Public toilets were installed and two other bedrooms were added. One of them, the Memorial Room, was built by volunteers as a tribute to their dead companions. This area also functions as a meeting room for museum executives and visiting organizations. The adjoining Lancaster Room, built as a meeting space and classroom, was transformed into an art gallery in 2007. It now features works by renowned Albertan artist Randy Fehr.



The facade of the original building would be a structure covered in "Cover-All" fabric. Covering 19,800 square feet / ft of land and featuring a 40-foot roof, the building would easily accommodate the Lancaster bomber and most of the larger aircraft in the museum collection. Dramatically increasing the storage area as well as providing protection was a much needed and much delayed addition.



On May 1, 2007, the construction team finally began installing vertical trusses. Running for 180 feet along both sides of the courtyard, all twenty trusses were fully installed by Cover-All staff mid-afternoon on the first day. The experienced crew worked quickly and efficiently and the long-awaited shelter began to take shape shortly. The following Monday, ten large roof trusses were 110 feet long in the courtyard, and for the first time since its return to Canada in 1945, the Lancaster was under a roof, a long delayed break from the elements. Within two weeks, the newest aspect of the museum was largely completed. The aluminum frame was completely covered by a blue and white fabric wrapper.



Museum Hours - 10am - 4pm - 7 days a week

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