In May, MGA's history department entered into a partnership with the Museum of Aviation to catalog its 483rd Bombardment Group archival collection. The 483rd Bombardment Group was activated in September 1943 and fought with the Fifteenth Air Force during WWII from April 1944 to April 1945, playing a significant role in the defeat of German enemy forces. Since the 1990s, the Museum of Aviation has been in possession of this collection from soldiers who fought with the 483rd. The collection is temporarily being housed on the 2nd floor of the Macon Campus Library while MGA students catalog and digitize the collection.
This semester, the HIST 3010 Introduction to Public History students started working with this collection. They cataloged a small portion of it and created an exhibit. “‘From the Skies, We Conquer:’ 483rd Bombardment Group Collections and Memorabilia” is on the second floor of the library.
The collection is open to the public for research. It contains a wide array of documents and artifacts, ranging from flight/bombing mission reports, mechanical/maintenance records, newsletters for the legacy group that emerged after the war, a host of photographs, European/Army memorabilia, and P.O.W. diaries. - Dr. Susan Asbury, MGA assistant professor of history.
