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Best WWII museums

Spitfire

I'll Lock Up
Messages
5,078
Location
Copenhagen, Denmark.
This is of course a very personal thing, but let's try and make a list and come up with some reason why's.

United Kingdom:
Imperial War museum in London.
Allways worth a visit - not only because they have a fantastic collection. But also because the layout of the museum and different exibitions makes it very alive and inviting.
Not too many weapons stacked together - only the most important ones. Like their choice of uniforms.
The WWI trench experience is scary and the Blitz experience, where you actually sits in a bombshelter during the blitz is truely amacing.
They always have some very interesting special exebitions too.

Imperial War Museum/Duxford is - surprise, surprise - my favourit museum over all.
Great planes - flying, being re-built and maintained in this historic airfield.
Fantastic stationary exebition of planes. The American Museum is a great tribute to USAAF.
And the Airshows they run....:eusa_clap
The mecca for all true flyboys. I love it!:eusa_clap :eusa_clap

France:
Musee de la Paix in Caen
Fairly new - and a fantastic experience. Architecture and exebition working together in a "not-seen-yet" way.
Takes you through the background of WWII - the 30s, with a walk down a spirale, always down - untill you end up in front of a huge picture of Hitler at a nazi rally in Munich. (Scary)
The dark, depressing time of the occupation is litterally getting you down, when you walk through the sombre low cieling area...the D-day experience knocks you off your feet, with its double screen movie.
The tools of war - layed out in an almost clinical, white hall.
GREAT and different.
Makes you stop - makes you think.:eusa_clap :eusa_clap

The D-day museum in Bayeux.
Great museum, uniforms, weapons etc. from axis and allies.
To my liking maybe just a little bit too crowded. Too many things to see.
You sort of "gets blinded" when you walk through it.
But a must for all D-day afficionados.:)

Denmark (If you ever come this way ;) ):
The Museum of Resistance
Close to the Royal Palace. Gives you a good and solid overview of the five occupation years. Fairly modern layout and easy to get through. Many facinating items.
 

eniksleestack

One of the Regulars
Messages
114
Location
Santa Barbara, CA
I'm going to be in England for the first time ever this summer. I'm drooling at the possibility of visiting the Imperial War Museum -- top of my itinerary.

Any other suggestions for museum/ WW1/WW2 experiences in London, Paris, and /or Lyon?
 

Miss Sis

One Too Many
Messages
1,888
Location
Hampshire, England Via the Antipodes.
Yes, The Britain at War experience in London is good too.

Here's the address:

Winston Churchill's
Britain at War Experience
64 - 66 Tooley Street
London Bridge
London SE1 2TF

http://www.britainatwar.co.uk

Central and easy to get to. It is a sort of museum but with tableux you walk past with the sounds playing etc.

Imperial War Museum is one of the best. My favourite bit is the full sized recreation of the 1940s house from the tv programme where a family goes to live the wartime experience as realistically as possible (which I have never seen!) It shows a typical 1930s house in wartime guise.The actual house is not very far from where I work in South London. They also decorate it with Christmas decorations in December. It looks like the family have just gone out and will be back in a minute.
 

Warden

One Too Many
Messages
1,336
Location
UK
We are lucky to have so many good WW2 museums here in the UK, but I always get excited when I go to one of the Imperial War Museums.

Harry
 

nobodyspecial

Practically Family
Messages
514
Location
St. Paul, Minnesota
The imperial war museum in London is very good. I was there in 2005 and very much enjoyed the visit. The WWI trench was an eye opener for me. I also very much enjoyed Churchill's headquarters/bunker. I am forgetting the exact name, maybe the Cabinet War Room. London is a great city to visit, one of my favorites.
 

BellyTank

I'll Lock Up
Museum of the Occupation(Bes?¶ttelsesmuseet), ?Örhus, Denmark.

A large collection of German Occupation, resistance and
Allied bombing-related memorabilia.

The setting was ?Örhus' Gestapo HQ until'41.

I used to live opposite the Museum.

B
T
 

mikepara

Practically Family
Messages
565
Location
Scottish Borders
Also...

Interested just google it.

In London there's the British Army Museum Hospital Road, Obviously not just WWII but theres enough to satisfy.

HMS Belfast If Warships are your thing.

Guards Museum. By the left quick...MARCH.

Battle Of Britain Museum (Old RAF) Hawkinge.. a great little gem.

Parachute Regiment and Airborne Forces Museum Browning Barracks Aldershot. Fanbloodytastic. When I was stationed in Aldershot I went every single week for a shot of 'Thats why I am Airborne".

Airborne Museum Hartenstein Oosterbeek Holland. The Arnhem HQ The whole towns a pilgrimage. Hallowed ground forever. All the brave Dutch, British, Polish and German dead.

82d Airborne Division Memorial Museum Ft Bragg NC. Hooooorah! All the way, Sir!!
 

MagistrateChris

One of the Regulars
Messages
127
Location
Central Ohio
If you ever find yourself near Dayton, Ohio and have a few hours to kill, I highly recommend you take a trip over to the U.S. Air Force Museum, Great exhibits covering everything from the origins of flight through the Gulf War. It's free to the general public, so you can't beat the costs. The WWII exhibit is terrific, and has clothing to keep you interest. It also has a great gift shop, just to tempt you with the right A-2 for the drive home.

http://www.wpafb.af.mil/museum/
 

dhermann1

I'll Lock Up
Messages
9,154
Location
Da Bronx, NY, USA
The Deutsches Museum in Munich has an amazing group of WWII vintage German airplanes, including a V-2 with its insides showing, and an ME-262, among many other things.
 

Fletch

I'll Lock Up
Messages
8,865
Location
Iowa - The Land That Stuff Forgot
The Cabinet War Rooms under Parliament are a must-see when you're in London.

The U-505 at Chicago's Museum of Science & Industry is a MUST must-see - the only German sub in the USA and you can tour her insides.

Has anyone been to the American Airpower Museum on Long Island? It's at the old Republic (as in P-47) Field. They're having a fighter fly-in Aug. 5 and 6 to commemorate V-J Day.
 

dhermann1

I'll Lock Up
Messages
9,154
Location
Da Bronx, NY, USA
The Intrepid should be a great WWII museum, I'm not sure what it really wants to be. It's fun to visit anyway. It has a lot of WWII displays, at any rate. I don't know when she'll be back at her berth, she's getting repaired in Staten Island.
 

Paratrooper

Familiar Face
Messages
80
Location
Burnsville MN
Another one near Chicago the Big Red One Museum (just get off at the Winfeild stop on the train not the Winton....long story...don't ask) it is the the Cantigy (spelling) The gut who onwed one of the big Chicago papers was in the 1st Div in WW1 and set this up.
 

Thomas G

New in Town
Messages
5
Location
England
One of my all time favourites is the Tank Museum at Bovington in the south-west of England. It has a fantastic collection of AFVs from 1914 to the present, but the bulk date from the two World Wars. The range of German tanks from the Second World War is especially impressive considering how few survived the war (they even have one of the few remaining working Tigers). The DD Sherman with its flotation screen is also a ‘must see’. It must have been a truly terrifying machine to operate in the choppy waters of the channel, even before factoring in the effect of enemy fire. The website (http://www.tankmuseum.co.uk/home.html) fails to do justice to just how large and varied a collection this is!


On a smaller scale, the Army Medical Services Museum (http://www.ams-museum.org.uk/index.htm) gives a fascinating insight into an often overlooked aspect of the war. Again this covers a much longer period than just the Second World War, but definitely worth a look if you’re ever in the Aldershot area (could be combined with a visit to the Airborne Forces Museum mentioned by Mikepara)..
 

aswatland

My Mail is Forwarded Here
Messages
3,338
Location
Kent, England
I surprised no one has mentioned the excellent RAF museum at Hendon, north London. It has an amazing collection of aircraft going back to WW1. There are uniforms, equipments, pictures etc.. all clearly explained.
 

Rufus

Practically Family
Messages
518
Location
London
The Tank/Panzer Museum in Saumur, in France is fantastic!

I spent a very happy wet saturday there...and my girlfriend even pretended not to be too bored...! Bless her.

More Panzers and battledamaged tanks then you could ever hope to see.
They also have the last operational King Tiger tank.

rufus
 

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