This is an exterior view of the Cadet's Chapel. The structure is made up of 17 aluminum spires. The dark pyramid shaped areas and the dark narrow vertical lines are actually made up of small rectangles of colored glass which create amazing lighting inside the chapel.
This is an picture of the interior of the Protestant chapel, which is located on the main floor. From the floor to the highest point of the ceiling is 99 feet. There are 3 other chapels on the lower level to serve the specific needs of Catholics, Jews and Buddhists.
There is a large aluminum cross suspended above the rostrum.
This is a close up of the rostrum and it's furnishings.
At the rear of the chapel is a choir loft and a huge pipe organ. The organ consists of 4,334 pipes, the largest of which is 32 feet long and the smallest of which is the size of a pencil. The organ was designed by the Holtkamp Organ Company and built by the M.P. Moller Company. There is a large mirror in front of the organ so that the organist can see what is going on at the front of the chapel.
This picture shows what the inside of the chapel looks like with late afternoon sun shining through the colored glass panels. This is all natural light, there were no lights on in the chapel at the time.
The chapel has pews to accommodate 1,200 attendees. The end of the pew is designed to resemble the end of a propeller from a World War I aircraft. The seat back is curved slightly from top to bottom and is capped at the top with an aluminum strip resembling the leading edge of a modern day jet fighter.
On a large plaza area about a hundred yards from the chapel there are several bronze representations of planes that were significant during World War II. This particular one is of a P-51 Mustang, one of my favorite WW II era planes. These representations had wingspans from about 8 to 12 feet long and fuselage lengths of about 10 to 16 feet long, depending on the type of plane being represented.
There is also a tribute to the Tuskegee Airmen, a group of black pilots who flew in WW II.
