[Congressional Record Volume 154, Number 51 (Wednesday, April 2, 2008)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page E488]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




    HONORING DON LOPEZ'S SERVICE TO THE SMITHSONIAN AND HIS COUNTRY

                                 ______
                                 

                            HON. BART GORDON

                              of tennessee

                    in the house of representatives

                        Wednesday, April 2, 2008

  Mr. GORDON of Tennessee. Madam Speaker, I rise today to honor the 
legacy of Donald S. Lopez.
  Don, described as a ``walking encyclopedia'' by his friends and 
colleagues, was hired by the Smithsonian as assistant director for 
aeronautics in 1972. He was part of the team, which included Apollo 
astronaut and then director Michael Collins, that planned the National 
Air and Space Museum, which opened in 1976 and would become the most 
visited museum in the world.
  Don's love of and knowledge of flight began as a boy--seeing Charles 
Lindbergh parade through the streets of Brooklyn, New York; reading 
World War I aviation publications; and hitching rides on barnstormers. 
He enlisted in the U.S. Air Force in 1942. A year later, Don received 
his wings. During his 2 years in China, he flew 101 missions and scored 
five victories to become a World War II ace fighter pilot. He received 
the Silver Star, Distinguished Flying Cross with One Oak Leaf Clusters, 
Soldier's Air Medal with Two Oak Leaf Clusters, Soldier's Medal, and 
Chinese Breast Order of Yun Hui.
  After World War II, he became a test pilot and finished his 
education, earning a master's degree in aeronautics from the California 
Institute of Technology. Apollo 8 astronaut Frank Borman was one of his 
classmates. In the early 1960s, Don helped establish the aeronautics 
program at the new U.S. Air Force Academy. He retired from the Air 
Force in 1964 and worked as a systems engineer on the Apollo-Saturn 
Launch Vehicle and Skylab Orbital Workshop.
  Lopez became deputy director of the National Air and Space Museum in 
1983 and held various advisory positions through the late 1990s. He was 
most proud of the Pioneers of Flight gallery, which he filled with 
``such great airplanes.'' In his lifetime, he flew more than 32 
different types of aircraft.
  I am especially grateful to Don for choosing my constituents at 
Corporate Flight Management and Tangent Industries to rebuild and 
modify a Cessna 150 for an interactive display in the museum's How 
Things Fly gallery.
  Don Lopez will he interred at Arlington National Cemetery on April 
22, 2008. A memorial fund at the National Air and Space Museum has been 
named in his honor.
  Donald S. Lopez--a war hero, test pilot, educator, and preserver, of 
our Nation's aeronautic achievements--was truly a renaissance man.

                          ____________________