[Milsurplus] Chicago Museum U-505

[Ray Fantini]

Fairly serious charges, I have worked with some people involved with archival and research activities and find that almost imposable to imagine in a museum director. Thought that the U boat was one of that museums biggest draws?  Have known of cases where due to economic problems or by transferring part of a collection things get lost, or where corporate collections get disposed of by management's actions at levels above the curator or local management but this story on the surface appears to be a little over the top to me. I did a simple search about Vic Danelov and the museum and other then the links that are directly traced back to the Shark hunter's web site found no other material supporting there statement.
RF

-----Original Message-----


"We were trying to get a fix on the location of the only known WW I German U-Boat sunk in fresh water; that of UC-97 sunk in Lake Michigan off Wilmette.
We approached the Museum of Science and Industry and the Director, Vic Danelov, about an expedition to raise UC-97 and put her next to U-505.  When he asked why, I told him that this Museum would be the only one in the world with a WW I and a WW II German U-Boat.  "I don't even want this one!" was his reply.  And he paid a scrap dealer to come to the Museum and cart off TWO ENTIRE storerooms full of spare parts from U-805 that were to be used to keep U-505 in repair!  Just threw this priceless stuff in the trash!"

Harry Cooper, 1983.
via: Hue Miller