BRIEFING Casper, Wyoming Here are some reasons WY you should visit BY JULIE SUMMERS WALKER Jim Good's Wyoming Wildcatter, a modified T-6 Texan (top). The Casper Air Base has interesting aviation artifacts in the Good Aviation and Veterans Museum (above and far right). The Tate Geological Museum and the National Historic Trails Interpretive Center are worth the trip (right). L OCAT ED NE AR THE center of the state, Casper/Natrona County International Airport (CPR) is dubbed the Gateway to Wyoming. The airport began as a World War II training base for B-17, B-24, and P-39 crews. More than 18,000 airmen trained here and many of the original buildings, hangars, and living quarters still stand. They house such interesting sites as the Wyoming Veterans Memorial Museum in the original Enlisted Men's Service Club and the Good Aviation and Veterans Museum in the 461st Squadron Hangar. Two of the airport's original four runways are in use. The airport is considered one of the finest surviving examples of a World War II-era U.S. Army Air Forces base. The Wyoming Veterans Memorial Museum details the personal lives of Wyoming veterans from the Spanish-American War through World War II and the present. Of interest are the 15 murals painted on the building's walls-this original artwork was created by four servicemen serving at Casper in the 1940s. It depicts the history of Wyoming, which Cpl. Leon Tebbetts-one of those four artists-hoped would inspire the servicemen billeted here as they trained in the B-17 and B-24 bombers. 42 AOPA PILOT / September 2021 CHRIS ROSE