World War II traveling museum filled with artifacts stolen from Phoenix home

PHOENIX (3TV/CBS 5) — Bill Gaston and Scott Dunkirk looked through the World War II artifacts they still have left. Unfortunately, most of their other military memorabilia was stolen when someone drove off with their traveling museum.

“There are things in there I know we won’t be able to replace,” said Gaston. “They just don’t exist any more. They were a one-of-a-kind type thing.”

The Valley Veterans are both Arizona Ground Crew Living History Unit members. For the past 15 years, they’ve been visiting air shows, schools and other venues, where they set up camp and put their extensive World War II collection on display. The collection includes aircraft parts, tools, manuals, phones, radios, and the list goes on.

But their days on the road may be coming to an end after someone took their trailer with hundreds of those artifacts inside, worth more than $200K. “I honestly think it was random,” said Dunkirk. “I think they saw the trailer and thought, oh, we need that trailer and what’s in there. They probably got a surprise, because they thought they were quads or something like that, and its full of old military stuff.”

The trailer was parked in front of a house off Cactus Road and 35th Avenue in Phoenix on August 5th when someone drove off with it when no one was home.

The Vets hope that putting the story on the news will stir up some leads, and they’ll get their one-of-a-kind collection back. “If anyone is out hiking in some area, or they notice a big pile of Army green stuff that looks out of place, it most likely came out of our trailer,” said Gaston. “The trailer is replaceable, the contents are not.”

A GoFundMe page has been set up to help keep the traveling museum going. For details, click/tap here.

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