# Military equipment in parks **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [September 30, 2024, 7:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/military-equipment-in-parks/1008299 "2024-09-30T19:10:12Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![ASL\_v2.0](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/asl_v2.0/32/3525_2.png) [@ASL\_v2.0](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ASL_v2.0)\ **Post date:** [September 30, 2024, 11:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/military-equipment-in-parks/1008299/21 "2024-09-30T23:08:54Z")
> [@griffin1977](#): > > I’ve seen this in VFW buildings and military bases but I can recall ever seeing anything like that in a regular park in America… As just another example of the phenomenon in the wild, this park has had a tank in it since I was in was in kindergarten (if not earlier—we moved to the area just before I started kindergarten): > **[Liberty Park | Plano, TX - Official Website](https://www.plano.gov/1464/Liberty-Park)** > > Liberty Park is a neighborhood park with a playground, shade pavilion, picnic tables, grills, drinking fountain, and open sports practice fields (first come, first served). The tank is prominently featured in the opening seconds of the (very short) video tour at bottom. ---
**Author:** ![griffin1977](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/977dab/32.png) [@griffin1977](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/griffin1977)\ **Post date:** [September 30, 2024, 11:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/military-equipment-in-parks/1008299/22 "2024-09-30T23:09:16Z")
> [@beowulff](#): > > Silver Spring, just inside the Beltway at University Blvd. Ha! I’m near Collesville just past the beltway towards downtown 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Pork\_Rind](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pork_rind/32/111_2.png) [@Pork\_Rind](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pork_Rind)\ **Post date:** [September 30, 2024, 11:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/military-equipment-in-parks/1008299/23 "2024-09-30T23:26:37Z")
I remember the [F-86 that was parked in the Lunken Playfield in Cincinnati](https://i.pinimg.com/originals/6d/d8/3c/6dd83ced75a166c8b315e5228331f679.jpg). Mostly I remember not understanding why I only got to go once when it was clearly the greatest park in the history of parks. ---
**Author:** ![TriPolar](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tripolar/32/3008_2.png) [@TriPolar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TriPolar)\ **Post date:** [September 30, 2024, 11:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/military-equipment-in-parks/1008299/24 "2024-09-30T23:33:19Z")
Me too. In Maplewood on Alta Vista Rd. ---
**Author:** ![TriPolar](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tripolar/32/3008_2.png) [@TriPolar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TriPolar)\ **Post date:** [September 30, 2024, 11:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/military-equipment-in-parks/1008299/25 "2024-09-30T23:37:58Z")
Used to go there. The engine was removed so you could crawl through the the interior of the body from front to back. ---
**Author:** ![TriPolar](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tripolar/32/3008_2.png) [@TriPolar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TriPolar)\ **Post date:** [September 30, 2024, 11:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/military-equipment-in-parks/1008299/26 "2024-09-30T23:42:14Z")
We have a local park now owned by the town. It was until recently a monastery with a couple of WWII artillery pieces prominently displayed. ---
**Author:** ![Loach](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/loach/32/350_2.png) [@Loach](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Loach)\ **Post date:** [September 30, 2024, 11:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/military-equipment-in-parks/1008299/27 "2024-09-30T23:49:52Z")
I am a member of a private organization that sometimes fixes up rusty static displays. I don’t know about aircraft but all tanks on static display are still owned by the U.S. Army through TACOM. Here is a link to the program. As noted in the cite, it’s for places like museums and VFW halls. The equipment in front of National Guard posts comes from a different program. [https://tacom.army.mil/ilsc/donations/displays](https://tacom.army.mil/ilsc/donations/displays) ---
**Author:** ![blondebear](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/blondebear/32/1022_2.png) [@blondebear](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/blondebear)\ **Post date:** [September 30, 2024, 11:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/military-equipment-in-parks/1008299/28 "2024-09-30T23:52:56Z")
In Los Gatos the Oak Meadow Park playground has a T-33. It’s been on loan from the Air Force since 1974. [![](https://www.flyingmag.com/uploads/2022/09/t-33-in-park-nose.jpg?auto=webp&auto=webp&optimize=high&quality=70&width=1920) ](https://www.flyingmag.com/uploads/2022/09/t-33-in-park-nose.jpg?auto=webp&auto=webp&optimize=high&quality=70&width=1920) ---
**Author:** ![Crafter\_Man](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/crafter_man/32/458_2.png) [@Crafter\_Man](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Crafter_Man)\ **Post date:** [September 30, 2024, 11:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/military-equipment-in-parks/1008299/29 "2024-09-30T23:56:41Z")
When I was around 8 years old I remember playing on [the six cannons at DeRivera Park](https://putinbayonline.com/derivera-park-cannons/) on Put-in-Bay Island. We went back there about 20 years ago after we had children, and they were still there. ---
**Author:** ![susan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/susan/32/17537_2.png) [@susan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/susan)\ **Post date:** [September 30, 2024, 11:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/military-equipment-in-parks/1008299/30 "2024-09-30T23:57:42Z")
Never seen this in the US except on bases (e.g., Joint Base Lewis-McChord on I-5 in Washington) and museums. ---
**Author:** ![kenobi\_65](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kenobi_65/32/13178_2.png) [@kenobi\_65](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kenobi_65)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2024, 12:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/military-equipment-in-parks/1008299/31 "2024-10-01T00:21:52Z")
There’s a park in suburban Chicago, [Cantigny](https://cantigny.org/) (pronounced can-TEEN-ee), which features a military museum, and has a “[Tank Park](https://www.fdmuseum.org/exhibits/c/tank-park/),” with a number of retired tanks, primarily from WWII. That said, while it’s open to the public, it’s apparently a privately-funded park, run by the McCormick Foundation (the park grounds were formerly his home and estate). ---
**Author:** ![Darren\_Garrison](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/darren_garrison/32/92_2.png) [@Darren\_Garrison](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Darren_Garrison)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2024, 1:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/military-equipment-in-parks/1008299/32 "2024-10-01T01:12:21Z")
> [@Darren\_Garrison](#): > > I can think of three reasonably nearby displays: a tank, a fighter jet on a plinth, and a large anti-aircraft gun. The gun in in front of a VFW, I think the other two are at parks (though possibly not, they are that kind of thing that has always been there so you don’t pay much attention). Okay, my local tank is at an American Legion but the jet is in a park, and is a memorial to a pilot from the Cuban Missle Crisis, which I read about at some point then forgot. [https://www.reddit.com/r/TankPorn/comments/8y6a8r/anderson\_sc\_american\_legion\_has\_a\_nice\_tank/](https://www.reddit.com/r/TankPorn/comments/8y6a8r/anderson_sc_american_legion_has_a_nice_tank/) > **[Major Rudolf Anderson Jr. Memorial](https://10best.usatoday.com/destinations/south-carolina/greenville/cleveland-park/attractions/major-rudolf-anderson-jr-memorial/)** > > Major Rudolf Anderson Jr. Memorial: Born and raised in the Greenville area, Major Rudolf Anderson, Jr. is nothing short of a local hero. He had established an illustrious and decorated career in the Air Force, but while flying a reconnaissance... ---
**Author:** ![elbows](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/b3f665/32.png) [@elbows](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elbows)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2024, 9:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/military-equipment-in-parks/1008299/33 "2024-10-01T09:12:03Z")
A few minutes walk from my home is the city’s central park, Victoria Park, once an army base when the city was founded. It is home to a M4A2 Sherman Tank, from 6th Armoured Regiment, (1st Hussars), which landed at DDay. I think every child in the city has climbed on that thing. It was recently removed, (my that’s a BIG crane and truck!) and totally rehabbed. It’s known as the Holy Roller. ---
**Author:** ![mixdenny](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mixdenny/32/2962_2.png) [@mixdenny](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mixdenny)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2024, 5:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/military-equipment-in-parks/1008299/34 "2024-10-01T17:00:22Z")
People do collect military vehicles including tanks and similar things. A friend of mine has a British Ferret. It’s a reconnaissance vehicle that looks like a small tank. It is outstandingly cool. It has rubber tires and is street licensed. It has been used in a movie. He is a class 3 arms dealer so he can mount a real machine gun on it although it has a dummy mounted. We went to look at another vehicle at some local company that specializes in all things military. He had a warehouse full of tanks and things. Two different restaurants near me have “Deuces” on display, large 6 wheeled cargo trucks. > **[Ferret armoured car](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ferret_armoured_car#/media/File:Aldham_Old_Time_Rally_2015_-_18081932993.jpg)** > > The Ferret armoured car, also commonly called the Ferret scout car, is a British armoured fighting vehicle designed and built for reconnaissance purposes. The Ferret was produced between 1952 and 1971 by the UK company Daimler. It was widely used by regiments in the British Army, as well as the RAF Regiment and Commonwealth countries throughout the period. > The Ferret was developed in 1949 as a result of a British Army requirement issued in 1947. 'Light reconnaissance cars' existed during the ... ---
**Author:** ![JohnGalt](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johngalt/32/184_2.png) [@JohnGalt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JohnGalt)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2024, 5:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/military-equipment-in-parks/1008299/35 "2024-10-01T17:13:06Z")
Driving across Minnesota, you see lots of these displays in parks, especially in small towns. Tanks, artillery pieces, mounted old fighter jets. Maybe the local VFW or American Legion sponsors them, or there’s really nothing else notable about the town so they had to have something. Other towns commonly have an old steam locomotive or caboose. Or as in my small town, a US Civil War monument, installed about 1910, even though the town didn’t even exist then. ---
**Author:** ![thelurkinghorror](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/7c8e57/32.png) [@thelurkinghorror](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/thelurkinghorror)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2024, 8:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/military-equipment-in-parks/1008299/36 "2024-10-01T20:41:20Z")
The most prominent Ferret owner is Richard D. James, aka Aphex Twin. I don’t know if he still has it. ---
**Author:** ![Elmer\_J.Fudd](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/elmer_j.fudd/32/1211_2.png) [@Elmer\_J.Fudd](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elmer_J.Fudd)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2024, 9:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/military-equipment-in-parks/1008299/37 "2024-10-01T21:08:41Z")
> [@Elmer\_J.Fudd](#): > > When I was a kid in the early 1970s there was a Korean War era fighter jet in Lions Park (Costa Mesa, CA). You could climb into the cockpit (no canopy) or wiggle your way into the engine tube. Lots of jagged aluminum edges and a surface that would leave burns in the summer. It was eventually coated in concrete and the engine tube sealed up. I found this Facebook video about the history of this plane. It’s a Navy Panther from the Korean War. One of its pilots purchased it from the navy for $1 on condition that it be converted to playground use. > **[3.5K views · 81 reactions | Costa Mesa Flashback - The Airplane at Lions Park...](https://www.facebook.com/CostaMesaCityHall/videos/costa-mesa-flashback-the-airplane-at-lions-park/340279600879357/)** > > Happy #ThrowbackThursday! As 2021 nears its close, we take a look back at one of the City of Costa Mesa's most beloved centerpieces...the playground... ---
**Author:** ![aceplace57](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aceplace57/32/3500_2.png) [@aceplace57](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/aceplace57)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2024, 10:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/military-equipment-in-parks/1008299/38 "2024-10-01T22:01:56Z")
The Memphis Belle was on display at a the Armory in Memphis for decades. It was in bad shape when I saw it. The Air Force reclaimed it and did a restoration. It at a base in Ohio now. Link [The Memphis Belle](https://www.wearethemighty.com/mighty-history/memphis-belle-b-17/) Link [Memphis Belle (aircraft) - Wikipedia](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Memphis_Belle_(aircraft)) > [@](#): > > It was flown to Memphis in July 1946 and stored until mid-1949, when the bomber was placed on display at the [National Guard](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_National_Guard) armory near the city’s fairgrounds. It sat out-of-doors into the 1980s, slowly deteriorating from weather and [vandalism](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vandalism). Souvenir hunters removed almost all of the interior components. Eventually, no instruments were left in the cockpit, and virtually every removable piece of the B-17’s interior had been scavenged, often severing the wiring and control cables in the process ---
**Author:** ![Melbourne](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/b5e925/32.png) [@Melbourne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Melbourne)\ **Post date:** [October 2, 2024, 6:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/military-equipment-in-parks/1008299/39 "2024-10-02T06:15:23Z")
Originally Aus states always had a few canons in the parks: what else are you going to do with them? And everybody loves a gun (cf ‘gun control’). America was the same, with, as I recall, a lot of civil war canons around. Following WWI, the Americans took a _lot_ of WWI trophy artillery, and distributed it to the states as war memorial / trophies. Aus and the USA diverge on civic display of more recent weapons. In Aus, the military brought back weapons from WWI which were stockpiled, loaned to school cadet units, and given to RSL clubs (cf RSS&AL, Veterans of Foreign Wars, ‘American Legion’) as war memorials / ‘trophies’. Most of that was recalled at the start of WWII. Not all of the war memorials / trophies went to the RSL. City councils got some of them and put them in war memorial parks. They were supposed to maintain and preserve the trophies, but didn’t. Some of it deteriorated very rapidly, and was junked within a couple of years. Regular garden maintenance continued to junk more as time went on. Eventually all that was left in civic parks was the very heavy remains of very heavy guns. In the 70’s/80’s, left-wing city councils removed some of the remaining heavy guns from city parks as part of a performative political exercise. Sold for scrap, a couple of those were recovered by a private park near where I live. When Aus banned ‘automatic weapons’ in 1996, the gun buy-back took mostly semi-automatic 22’s, but also included a few heavy machine guns held as war memorials by RSL clubs. And I think some of the recent artillery held by RSL’s disappeared at the same time. This was almost all Aus surplus – after WWII, not much was transported to Aus as ballast, perhaps the post-WWI experience had tempered their desire for park weapons. ---
**Author:** ![Smapti](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/smapti/32/17938_2.png) [@Smapti](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Smapti)\ **Post date:** [October 2, 2024, 6:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/military-equipment-in-parks/1008299/40 "2024-10-02T06:43:24Z")
When I was a kid in San Diego in the '80s, my dad worked for General Dynamics, and the company owned a private park next to the factory specifically for the use of employees and their families. It was called “Missile Park” because there was an Atlas ICBM standing upright near the entrance. You could run around underneath it and look up into it. I believe the park was eventually donated to the city after GD closed up shop there, and the missile was removed and erected somewhere else. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/military-equipment-in-parks/1008299.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/military-equipment-in-parks/1008299.md?page=3)