Parham Airfield Museum (390th Bomb Group Memorial Air Museum)
About
The Parham Airfield Museum, more commonly known today as the 390th Bomb Group Memorial Air Museum, commemorates the American airmen who flew from RAF Parham — also referred to during the war as Framlingham airfield — in rural Suffolk during the Second World War. The museum occupies the restored control tower of the former USAAF Station 153, from which the 390th Bombardment Group flew B-17 Flying Fortresses on deep-penetration daylight bombing missions into occupied Europe and Germany between 1943 and 1945.
The 390th Bombardment Group (Heavy) arrived at Parham in the summer of 1943 as part of the rapid wartime expansion of the United States Eighth Air Force's strategic bombing campaign, based across dozens of hastily constructed airfields throughout Suffolk and Norfolk. Alongside the neighbouring 100th Bomb Group at Thorpe Abbotts — a separate, already well-known airfield museum with its own distinct history — the 390th shared in the extraordinarily costly precision daylight bombing campaign against German industrial and military targets, flying missions that frequently faced determined fighter opposition and heavy anti-aircraft fire long before long-range fighter escort became available from early 1944.
The museum's displays document the 390th Bomb Group's operational history, its aircraft and aircrew, the physical infrastructure of a wartime American heavy bomber base transplanted into the quiet Suffolk countryside, and the profound and lasting impact this sudden American presence had on the local community around Framlingham and the surrounding villages. Personal accounts, photographs, uniforms, and artefacts recovered from the airfield site and donated by veterans and their families bring the human story of the base to life alongside the technical and operational history of the bombing campaign itself.
Like the great majority of small volunteer-run wartime airfield museums surviving in East Anglia, the 390th Bomb Group Memorial Air Museum operates with limited, seasonal opening — normally Sunday afternoons through the spring, summer, and early autumn months — reflecting its dependence entirely on volunteer time and effort rather than paid staffing. Visitors are encouraged to check the museum's current opening calendar before travelling, particularly outside the main visitor season, as with the comparable and better-known 100th Bomb Group Memorial Museum nearby.
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Plan Your Visit
⏱️ Recommended Visit Duration
💡 Visitor Tips
- The museum is open Sundays only (plus bank holiday Mondays), Easter to early autumn — check the website for exact dates before travelling.
- A car is essential, as the airfield site has no practical public transport connection.
- If you have American family members who served with the 390th Bomb Group, contact the museum in advance — volunteers are often able to help with research.
- Combine your visit with nearby Framlingham Castle for a fuller day exploring the area's very different layers of military history.
- Allow time to explore the surrounding airfield site, where physical traces of the wartime infrastructure remain visible in the farmland.
- The small tea room is a welcome stop, but options are limited — consider bringing your own refreshments as a backup.
- Photography is generally permitted throughout the museum.
- Volunteer guides bring deep personal or family knowledge of the 390th Bomb Group's history that greatly enriches a visit.
Highlights
The Restored Control Tower
The museum occupies the restored control tower of RAF Parham, USAAF Station 153, one of the surviving structures from the airfield that once housed the 390th Bomb Group. The building has been carefully restored and fitted with displays tracing the airfield's operational history from its wartime construction through to the present day.
The 390th Bombardment Group's Story
The museum documents the 390th Bomb Group's arrival at Parham in 1943 and its subsequent operational history flying B-17 Flying Fortresses on daylight precision bombing missions against German industrial and military targets, including the heavy losses suffered before long-range fighter escort became available and the eventual contribution of strategic bombing to Allied victory in Europe.
The B-17 Flying Fortress and Aircrew Life
Displays explain the B-17 Flying Fortress's characteristics and crew roles, and the extreme physical and psychological conditions faced by aircrew flying at high altitude in unheated aircraft under sustained enemy fighter and flak attack, drawing on personal testimony from 390th Bomb Group veterans.
Personal Testimony and Veteran Accounts
Letters, photographs, and recorded interviews with 390th Bomb Group veterans and their families, gathered over decades, preserve first-hand accounts of life at Parham — from the routines of base life to the fear and camaraderie of combat missions over Germany — giving individual voices to the Group's collective history.
Collections
The Parham Airfield Museum holds an archive relating to the 390th Bomb Group and RAF Parham, including photographs, mission records, personal letters and diaries, uniform items, aircraft equipment, and artefacts recovered from the airfield site. The personal testimony collection, gathered from American veterans and their families over several decades, forms a particularly significant part of the archive, alongside material documenting the relationship between the airfield's American personnel and the surrounding Suffolk communities.
The collection continues to grow through ongoing contact with the 390th Bomb Group veteran and descendant community in the United States.
The 390th Bomb Group at Parham
The complete story of the 390th Bombardment Group's time at RAF Parham, from arrival in 1943 to the end of the war in Europe.
📍 Main Galleries
Americans in Suffolk: The Eighth Air Force
The story of the American airfields that transformed wartime Suffolk and the communities that hosted them.
📍 Community Gallery
Current Exhibitions
No current exhibitions. Please check the museum website for updates.