Abandoned Paintings Make Air Force History

CHEYENNE MOUNTAIN AIR FORCE STATION, Colo. -- Nine paintings depicting the evolution of air and space, which are displayed in the Cheyenne Mountain Air Force Station technical support building lobby, will be adopted into the Air Force Art Program this year.

The paintings were rescued years ago after being abandoned inside a storage closet at the Chidlaw Building, the then-headquarters building for the Aerospace Defense Command of the North American Air Defense Command.

Since their rescue, the 3-by-4 paintings have been displayed in various CMAFS conference rooms and offices. Once the paintings become part of the Air Force Art Program, no one can ever put them in a closet again.

"The big significance is that we capture some heritage, so that it doesn't get lost," said Col. Russell Wilson, tjhe 721st Mission Support Group commander at CMAFS.

The paintings will be assigned inventory numbers with instructions that they are not to be moved without notifying the Air Force Art Program, said Russell Kirk, the Air Force Art Program director.

"If we didn't accession them, they could be put in a closet and be forgotten," Mr. Kirk said. "With accession numbers, if someone were remodeling and didn't want those paintings anymore, they would come back to us."

For years, the paintings have been a source of conversation and mystery, Colonel Wilson said. The only clue about the paintings' origins is the signature, "T. Patterson." Beyond that, the paintings are not dated and no one knows who T. Patterson was.

"We still ask the question, where did these paintings come from?" he said.

Art Marthaller, a retired chief master sergeant and retired Department of Defense civilian, found the discarded paintings in the mid 1980s in the Chidlaw Building. The paintings were covered in dust, but he liked them, he said.

"I knew those paintings were something special," he said.

Chief Marthaller asked around and no one objected, so he took them up to the mountain and put them up in the conference room.

The paintings run as a series that begin with Greek mythology and the depiction of Icarus, the Greek man who made wings of feathers and wax to escape Crete. However, he flew too close to the sun and melted his wings causing his crash to earth.

Each painting has a number of faces or images that represent different eras of flight history. The paintings depict the first manned balloon flight in France by the Montgolfier brothers in 1783 and the first successful airplane flight by the Wright brothers in 1903.

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