Documentary details Miss Montana restoration

What seemed impossible to a group of volunteers became possible, and a new film is telling the grassroots story of how it happened. "Return to the Big Skies – The Story Miss Montana to Normandy" is a documentary screening this month that tells the story of the Museum of Mountain Flying's effort to restore a WWII aircraft in time for the 75th anniversary of D-Day.

"It is really hard to describe. Good things just keep happening," said Bryan Douglass with the Museum of Mountain Flying, one of the volunteers to work on the Miss Montana project. "This whole project, the whole story ... It's remarkable. I've seen the film. It is outstanding."

"A friend of a friend called us in the very early stages and said we might want to go see what's happening," Eric Ristau of One Acre Films said of how he became involved with the Miss Montana project. He started filming in September 2018 as the project was just getting going. "It was fascinating. This is a grassroots hometown Montana film about this group of people and trying to bring this airplane back."

The Museum of Mountain

Flying purchased the aircraft in 2001. It was built in the 1930s as a Douglas C-47 and converted to a DC-3 when it became a civilian aircraft, the film explains. It sat at the museum for 18 years before volunteers heard of the D-Day Squadron, a group that was planning to re-enact the invasion at Normandy on the 75th anniversary. The plane had roots in Montana, as Bob Johnson with Johnson Flying Service purchased it in 1946.

"It was a race against time from the very beginning," Bryan Douglass with the Museum of Mountain Flying says in the film, which captured the year-long effort to restore the plane in time for the June 2019 trip across the Atlantic. He said Ristau captured all sides of the restoration project. "There were a handful of us leading the project, in the media, flying the plane. He (Eric) did a lot more than just interview a handful of people."

Douglass said the real story of the plane's restoration is in the volunteer effort. "The people that worked on it, supported it, flew it and pulled it off ... for that to happen with no money, no volunteers, nothing, and to raise half a million dollars in six months and barely pull it off, that's the story."

"Initially we had hoped to go with them to Europe, but it just wasn't in the cards. In the end, our film has focused on the grassroots community aspect of getting this plane back in the air," said Ristau, who created the documentary with his wife Geneva and Jenny Roher, a writer and producer.

Douglass, who wrote the book "Every Reason to Fail: The Unlikely Story of Miss Montana and the D-Day Squadron," published in 2020. He said the film is a good way to remind the volunteers of the work they did. "We had no chance when this thing started and look what we did. To see what you can do if you just keep working and believe in something... to see the emotion ripple through the crowd." He compared the film to writing the book. "A picture is worth a thousand words. I am just so tickled that he did this," Douglass said of Ristau. "It's really powerful. When you watch it, it makes you proud to be from Montana."

The film, which runs about an hour and 15 minutes, takes a historical look at the Miss Montana aircraft, as well as the effort to prepare the plane for the D-Day anniversary. Ristau said one of the biggest challenges with the film was finding historical images and video. The plane's history includes the 1949 Mann Gulch wildfire near Helena. The aircraft carried 15 smokejumpers into the fire. Thirteen lost their lives on August 5, 1949. Another historical moment for the DC-3 was when it ran out of fuel hauling soldiers across the country and had to land in a river outside of Pittsburgh. As the group was working to restore Miss Montana, they found silt and driftwood in the wing. "There are endless amazing stories all linked to this airplane," Ristau said.

The film also highlights the contributions of women to the restoration effort. "We had more women jumpers than any other plane in the squadron and had the only woman mechanic," Douglass says in the film.

Miss Montana also has ties to Sanders County. Dick Komberec, a Thompson Falls High School (TFHS) alum, flew for Johnson Flying Service. His son Eric is now one of the Miss Montana pilots, as is Art Dykstra, another TFHS alumni. John Haines, a graduate of Plains High School, also worked on the Miss Montana project.

"Everybody at the Miss Montana project gave us full access," Ristau said. "We had it easy because the volunteers were out there working, in an unheated hangar, in one of the coldest winters we've had. We were a fly on the wall interviewing people and observing people. One Acre Films finished filming in May 2019 and editing was completed just last month. "This is a very, very low budget project done in a grassroots kind of way, kind of like the project," Ristau said. The Big Sky Film Institute provided fiscal sponsorship, allowing the production company to raise money as if they were a nonprofit.

"We are proud of the film," Ristau stated. "We are looking forward to honoring the volunteers. We tried to make sure that everybody that we could possibly interview is in there. We want to make sure people understand how much work went into it." All proceeds from the film will go to the Miss Montana project, Ristau added. Douglass also donates proceeds from his book to the project. Douglass said insurance for Miss Montana costs at least $12,000 each year, as well as fuel and maintenance. He noted that all of the labor is volunteer for the project.

Two screenings are planned for the film this month, one in Kalispell on September 11 and the other in Missoula on September 18. The Kalispell showing will be in an airplane hangar at the Sky Ranch Circle development. The event starts at 5:30 p.m. and the $30 admission includes dinner. The Missoula event begins at 6:30 p.m. at Big Sky Brewing's amphitheater. Tickets for that showing are $20. More information and tickets are available at missmontanamovie.com. Douglass said the Museum of Mountain Flying is also working on plans for a film tour in which they will fly the plane around the state and show the film. He said Miss Montana will continue to fly, go to events and fairs and the museum will work to keep the history of Miss Montana alive. "It's living history. That really resonates with kids," Douglass noted. "They can look at that back door and that's the door the Mann Gulch jumpers jumped out of two hours before they died."