WASHINGTON — Just weeks before the opening of the Smithsonian’s new aviation museum, 20 House of Representatives members have asked the Smithsonian to remove beer logos from a historic aerobatics plane.
In a letter sent this week to Smithsonian Secretary Lawrence Small, the lawmakers said the Loudenslager Stephens Akro Laser 200, which won several U.S. aerobatics titles as well as the 1980 World Aerobatic Championship, deserved to be in the museum. However, they said the Bud Light emblems were an advertisement and an inducement to drink, the wrong signals to send young visitors.
"The display of the plane with the Bud Light logos would needlessly commercialize the plane’s exhibition while marginalizing its true historical significance," wrote the members of Congress.
The plane was repainted in 1983 to announce its sponsorship by Anheuser-Busch beer.
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