WEEK'S BEST/Ride in a WWII Tank this Weekend

Photo by John Arundel Activities will include a display of 50 vintage military vehicles, including tanks from World War II to the present.

By John Arundel
 
MANASSAS, VA. - These days that site is little more than a dusty field about 28 miles from downtown Washington.

But on some weekends like next weekend, the armored toys come out, creating muddy indentures in the ground from World War II-era tanks and amphibious personnel carriers.
 

Photo by John Arundel John Abshire of Fort Bragg, N.C. and Marc Lauterbach of Falls Church, in the trenches at The National Museum of Americans in Wartime.

By 2014, this outdoor reenactment area will provide millions of tourists a true picture of daily life on the battlefront, as the American Wartime Museum rises from a cow patch in western Prince William County.

This weekend, the museum will hold its annual open house at Aden Field in Nokesville, Va., just outside of Manassas, to showcase its collection of working military vehicles and give visitors a glimpse of what the permanent museum will offer when it opens in 2014.

Activities will include a display of 50 vintage military vehicles, including tanks from World War II to the present, live demonstration of operational military vehicles, reenactments, including the U.S. Marine Corps Historical Company demonstration and a flame thrower demonstratio and opportunities for visitors to ride in military vehicles.
 
The American Wartime Museum is dedicated to honoring the men and women who served in all branches of the United States military and on the home front from World War I to the present.
 
The permanent home of the Museum will be located at Interstate 95 and Dale Boulevard in Prince William County.
 
The site belongs to Allan D. Cors, a public affairs consultant and former lobbyist, who has raised nearly $7 million so far from mostly patriotic alumni of the U.S. military to fulfill his dream. For decades, Cors collected barnloads of antique military equipment, often combing the backroads of Normandy in search of his quarry, much like a lepidopterist in search of rare, wondrous moths.
 
It started with a World War II-era Jeep in 1982 and morphed into a full-blown search for rickety tanks, armored personnel carriers, Indian motorcycles and other heavy wartime pieces, said Cors, whose poor hearing prevented him from ever serving in the military.

During the Berlin crisis of 1961, Cors volunteered for the draft to serve as an Army JAG lawyer (Judge Advocate General), but a punctured ear drum precluded him from serving. "My passion is to tell the story of those who did serve," he said.  
 
Cors has never stopped collecting, culling over 100 pieces of wartime machinery mostly from the forgotten battle towns and military-focused auction houses of Europe, often using "pickers" to hunt down rare pieces. The collection stretches from World War I to the Vietnam conflict, with a special emphasis on machinery used to conquer Hitler's Europe during the Second World War, at places like Pont de Hoc and Omaha Beach.
 

Photo by John Arundel Alan D. Cors is a weekend warrior who owns one of the world's largest collection of tanks and heavy military equipment. He is the founder of the National Museum of Americans in Wartime.

"We left so much machinery over there," he said wistfully. "It would be a shame to see it all go to rust and ruin."
 
Cors' collection started with a barn stacked floor to ceiling with vehicles and war materiel in Warrenton, VA., and progressed to storage at a huge warehouse in Crystal City.

Tank Farm getting started
Over the years, his interest in war machinery has shifted, he said. "My real interest now is in the people who fought these wars, and in their brave heroics," Cors said. "I'm fascinated by the values they demonstrated; their dedication, loyalty, sacrifice, leadership and devotion to the cause."
 
This weekend, Cors unmarked farm on a back country road in Prince William County will be abuzz with historic tanks, military vehicles and soldier re-enactors conducting life as it might have been on a World War II battlefield, minus the gunfire and live ammunition.
 
A 1941 Indian motorcycle will gun its engines, much as it might have been during wartime for the British dispatch riders who brought messages and plans to the battlefront. Produced under the Lend Lease Act by the Indian Motorcycle Co. of Springfield, Mass., the motorcyle, with its broad handlebars and leather saddlebag, was in meticulously working order. At auction, the classic war motorbikes fetch as much as $40,000.
 
"I'd love to have one of these," marvels Jim Houk, a pharmacist from Woodbridge, VA., who said he owns five modern-day motorcycles. "It's a work of art. It's history."
 

Photo by John Arundel Six year-old Alec Smolkan in a Russian artillery uniform from the Tsarist period of World War II.

Nearby, a three-ton amphibious truck will stand sentry, seemingly ready to transport a few Allied soldiers onto Omaha Beach. Developed in 1942, about 121,000 of these vehicles were developed by the Yellow Truck Division of General Motors by the end of World War II. It could carry about 25 soldiers and two tons of cargo in its massive, watertight hull.
 
"These were critical in supplying food and ammo to the war theater," Cors explained, as an A-20 armored utility car sped by and a noisy T-72 tank spit mud and grass from its treads.
 
Korean War-era military re-enactors stand behind sandbags in a freshly-dug trench, munching jumbo shrimp the size of silver dollars. "Lucky day for us," chuckled Marc Lauterbach of Falls Church, who teaches criminal justice at George Washington University.
 
"We're kind of weekend reservists," chimed in John Abshire of Fort Bragg, N.C., a civilian military contractor who drove up from Fort Bragg, N.C. This weekend Abshire is "serving" in the Army's 3rd Infantry, 23rd Regiment, deployed to Korea with his M1 Garand infantry rifle ("It packs more of a punch than a pistol," he brags). His regular "day job" in Fort Bragg, he said, is to serve as a Taliban combatant preparing Army soldiers for war in Afghanistan.

Nearby, Donald Taylor of Fairfax, a retired Park Ranger who served on a Coast Guard cutter as a Russian interpreter, wears a WWI uniform from the Siege of Leningrad period. "The Russians had many neighbors and they seem to have had issues with all of them," he said, as he poured tea from a brass Russian sumovar.
 
"We want to build a museum which honors those who served on the battlefront from World War I forward," said Craig Stewart of Alexandria, Episcopal High School's former director of development who now serves as President and CEO of the National Museum of Americans in Wartime. "We'll focus on telling the story of the individual and their personal sacrifice."
 
Stewart envisions a large site near Manassas which will feature the landscapes of war, dedicated to a particular conflict. "There might be recreations of bombed-out German villages or period-authentic demonstrations or re-enactments in a controlled environment," said Stewart, formerly director of development at Episcopal High School.
 

Photo by John Arundel A 1941 Indian motorcyle, in meticulously working order, driven by Kent Aist, of Prince George's County, MD.

The new museum is privately-funded and well-backed. Its leadership board includes about a dozen luminaries, including former Sen. Charles S. Robb (D-VA.), Virginia Secretary of Transportation Pierce R. Homer, and a smattering of military historians, Medal of Honor recipients and other U.S. military alumni.
 
Stewart said the $50 million museum will open in stages, as funding is procured and development milestones are reached. Some $25 million is needed to fund construction of the first phase. About $10 million has been raised, and Stewart's goal is to open the museum in Nov. 2014.
 
"We have a broad mission as a welcoming museum to the millions of tourists who come to the area and to the surviving families of the 20th century wars," Stewart said. "We think it's vital to keep their stories alive."
 
For more information, visittheir web site at www.nmaw.org.
 
IF YOU'RE GOING...
 
WHEN: 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. on Saturday, August 21, and Sunday, August 22, 2010. Vehicle and live-action demonstrations between 11:30 a.m. and 2:30 p.m.

WHERE: “Aden Field” at 13906 Aden Road, Nokesville Virginia, just outside of Manassas.  Ample free parking is available.

• If you plan to attend the open house on either day, please register at www.nmaw.org by clicking on the "Event Registration" button.
  

• Tank rides are limited each day to the 7 winners of our drawings. You can sign up at the membership table at the open house before 2:45 p.m. each day. Rides will take place between 3 and 4 p.m. both days.

• Parking is free but space is limited. Follow the direction of Sheriff's deputies to park in appropriate areas.

• If you cannot attend this weekend, you can learn more about the American Wartime Museum and subscribe to our newsletter at www.nmaw.org.