Spirit of St. Louis Timeline

For more than eight decades the Spirit of St. Louis has been on display at the Smithsonian, hanging for 48 years (1928–76) in the Arts and Industries Building alongside other pioneering aircraft.

Lindbergh delivered the Spirit of St. Louis to Bolling Field in Washington, D.C., on April 30, 1928. There he presented the plane to the Smithsonian Institution, where it has remained on display ever since.

Not long after the museum took possession of the Spirit, conservators applied a clear layer of varnish or shellac to the forward aluminum panels in an attempt to preserve the flags and artwork painted on the engine cowling — an artifact visible today as a gold tint.

Since 1976 the original Spirit of St. Louis has hung in the atrium of the Smithsonian's National Air and Space Museum, alongside the Bell X-1 and SpaceShipOne.

In 2015 the original Spirit of St. Louis was lowered to the floor of the National Air and Space Museum's Milestones gallery, and the tires were temporarily replaced with 'forklift' style tires.

The Smithsonian's Pioneers of Flight exhibit, home to the Spirit of St. Louis, reopened in 2025 following extensive renovation and modernization of the National Air and Space Museum galleries.

A reproduction of the Spirit of St. Louis was used in the 1938 Paramount film 'Men with Wings' starring Ray Milland, one of several screen appearances by replicas of the famous aircraft.

A 90% static reproduction was built in 1956 for the Warner Bros. film 'The Spirit of St. Louis' (1957) by studio employees. It is now on display at the Wings of the North Air Museum in Eden Prairie, Minnesota.

Three reproductions used in the 1957 film 'The Spirit of St. Louis' have survived: B-153 is displayed at the Missouri History Museum in St. Louis, B-156 is at The Henry Ford museum in Dearborn, Michigan, and B-159 belongs to the Cradle of Aviation Museum in Garden City, Long Island.

A reproduction known as Spirit 2 first flew on April 24, 1967, and appeared at the 1967 Paris Air Show where it made several flights over Paris, echoing Lindbergh's historic arrival there forty years earlier.

In 1972, Spirit 2 was bought for $50,000 by the San Diego Air & Space Museum (formerly San Diego Aerospace Museum) and placed on public display until it was destroyed by arson in 1978.

EAA founder Paul Poberezny flew a reproduction powered by a Continental R-670-4 radial engine in 1977 to commemorate the 50th anniversary of Lindbergh's Atlantic crossing and subsequent tour of the United States. It was intended as a conversion of a B-1 Brougham, but that airframe proved too deteriorated to be used.

Another airworthy reproduction was built by David Cannavo and first flown in 1979, powered by a Lycoming R-680 engine. In 1995 it was bought by Kermit Weeks for his Fantasy of Flight Museum in Polk City, Florida.

The museum built a replacement named Spirit 3 which first flew on April 28, 1979; it made seven flights before being placed on permanent public display.

A reproduction of the Spirit (Registration ES-XCL), which had been built and certified in Estonia in 1997, was written off on May 31, 2003.

In 1999, the San Diego Air & Space Museum built a non-flying example fitted with an original Wright J-5 engine, adding another authentic tribute to the famous aircraft.

A reproduction completed in 2002 is on display at St. Louis, commemorating the city whose businessmen funded Lindbergh's historic flight.

In August 2003, the Spirit 3 was removed from display and flown as a 75th Anniversary tribute to Lindbergh's 1927 transatlantic flight.

In 2015, with coordinated efforts by fellow Spirit researcher Ty Sundstrom and the National Air & Space Museum, John Norman took detailed measurements to correct errors in existing 'Morrow' drawings. A recently completed Old Rhinebeck Aerodrome reproduction, begun by founder Cole Palen and largely built by Ken Cassens, successfully flew in early December 2015 in upstate New York.

The Old Rhinebeck Aerodrome reproduction made its public debut flight on May 21, 2016, the 89th anniversary of Lindbergh's flight across the Atlantic.

Intending to create a copy of the aircraft 'as it sits now', with all patches and modifications recreated painstakingly and made airworthy, Norman completed the project in 2019. The maiden flight occurred July 28, 2019, and the public debut was September 8, piloted by Ron Fowler.

In late 2021, a documentary feature film centered on the reproduction project and its builder began production; as of 2022, a tentative summer 2023 release was expected.