On Target : Group Nears Funding Goal to Build 2 Hangars for World War II Aircraft

The troops of the Confederate Air Force are on yet another mission.

From a cramped office inside the group’s museum at the Camarillo Airport, the flying faithful are homing in on their target--raising more than $1 million to build two hangars for renovation and display of World War II-vintage aircraft.

Joe Peppito, a gravelly voiced, retired flight mechanic, has been dreaming, scheming and fussing about the plan for more than 15 years.

“When I joined this organization in ’83 we were operating out of trucks and I said, ‘I want to put up a hangar,’ ” said Peppito, who has been the group’s president or “wing leader” for the past year. “I’ve been pushing for it ever since.”

The effort has paid off. The group--best known for staging air shows and displaying aircraft and military paraphernalia from the 1930s and ‘40s--has received pledges for $600,000 since 1996.

A philanthropic group from Santa Barbara recently gave $50,000 while a woman whose nephews have been active in the Confederate Air Force donates $10,000 each Christmas.

Peppito, 75, believes about 80% of the group’s 250 members in Southern California have already donated.

At a groundbreaking ceremony last month, a stranger walked up to Peppito and handed him a check for $1,000.

“It’s those type of things that give us hope,” said the Newbury Park resident, who was a logistics manager for Rockwell International for 30 years.

Stephen Barber, an Oxnard stockbroker in charge of raising funds for the project, said many donors want to memorialize loved ones who served in the war and educate the next generation on what the veterans accomplished.

“All of us are trying to build a memorial to the people who saved the world,” Barber said. “It continually strikes us as absolutely amazing how few people under the age of 40 have any idea what World War II is all about. Our mission is to make sure they understand.”

Other members echoed this sentiment.

Russ Drosendahl, a retired airline pilot from Woodland Hills, was incredulous that a student visiting the museum had never heard of flying ace Jimmy Doolittle.

“Can you believe that?” he asked.

James H. “Jimmy” Doolittle of Los Angeles led a bombing raid on Tokyo in 1942 that boosted Americans’ sagging morale after Pearl Harbor and led to the Japanese defeat. An aviation pioneer, Doolittle eventually became a general.

“You rarely hear people talk about World War I and the same thing could happen with World War II,” he said. “Aviation had a big part in changing the war. People should know about this.”

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The museum in Camarillo is in a temporary trailer jammed with donated, bought, found or re-created World War II treasures. The Confederate Air Force, which assumed its name when one of its founders painted the moniker on an old fighter featuring the stars and bars, runs 80 such museums nationwide.

In Camarillo, a 48-star American flag hangs on the museum’s back wall. Three-pound flight helmets occupy a side table for children to try on. An airway beacon light shines across the room, while a bomb sight has been set up to display what Camarillo would look like from an enemy fighter plane.

“In so many museums, you just look at things and I wanted to have a museum where it comes alive when you play with it,” said volunteer Charles Miller, who organized many of the exhibits. As he chatted, he fiddled with a silk handkerchief bearing a map for pilots who had to bail out over the Solomon Islands in the South Pacific.

Six old planes sit exposed under a dilapidated shelter that was built for temporary use 50 years ago.

“We have corrosion problems,” Peppito said. “It’s like leaving your car out of doors for many years. The hot sun, cold, damp and wet certainly aren’t helping any.”

The museum’s prize airplane is a 1942 Japanese Zero, one of the first fighter planes ever built. Only six remain in the world, Peppito said, and though it has been flown recently, it still needs major repairs.

The Southern California wing also boasts a functioning C-46 Navy transport plane, a Curtiss Commando Transport called the China Doll. During the war, the plane--larger than a B-17--carried up to 50 paratroopers. It regularly flies in air shows and is airborne about 150 hours a year. The museum offers tours of the plane for $2, or free with the $3 museum admission.

Many of the group’s members are retired, and spend much of their leisure time at the museum.

Drosendahl, 77, said he fought World War II from Alabama, where he was a B-24 flight instructor. After the war he worked as a TWA pilot for nearly 35 years.

“When I retired, a friend recommended I join the Confederate Air Force and I asked, ‘What’s that?’ ” he said. Now, Drosendahl volunteers at least 30 hours a week at the museum. “It sounds almost like a full-time job, especially because I pay to have things done at my home--like mowing the lawn--that I do here. But I don’t mind doing it. I feel like it’s for a good cause.”

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The plan calls for construction on the first 15,000-square-foot hangar to begin in January and be completed about five months later.

“This will be a dream come true for me and, by golly, it will get done,” Peppito said. “In the past we would sit back and say, ‘Almost there’ and then lose it. We’re not going to lose it this time.”