Oshkosh: The Story Behind One of the World's Greatest Aviation Celebrations

Merlin is heading back to Oshkosh this year so we're kicking off a short series exploring the history, people, and technology behind general aviation’s biggest annual gathering.

From a Milwaukee Parking Lot to Wittman Field

EAA AirVenture Oshkosh traces back to 1953, when Paul Poberezny and a handful of fellow aviation enthusiasts founded the Experimental Aircraft Association as, essentially, a flying club. That first fly-in was a small part of the Milwaukee Air Pageant: fewer than 150 visitors registered and just 21 airplanes made it onto the ramp, most of them homebuilt or modified.

By 1959 the gathering had outgrown the Air Pageant and moved to Rockford, Illinois, where it spent a decade building the reputation and camaraderie still associated with the event today. In 1970, Rockford's facilities couldn't keep up. EAA member and aviation legend Steve Wittman suggested a small airport in Oshkosh, Wisconsin. As EAA communications director Dick Knapinski has put it, "Oshkosh is unique because it has two very long runways that don't cross, unlike most metropolitan or airline-based airports," which was exactly what the growing convention needed. There was just one catch: no convention infrastructure existed there yet. EAA's volunteers transformed it in roughly six months. The airport itself was later renamed Wittman Field in honor of Steve Wittman and has been home to the event ever since.

The event carried the name EAA Fly-In Convention for decades before being rebranded EAA AirVenture Oshkosh in 1998, reflecting how far beyond a grassroots fly-in the meetup had grown.

Highlights Along the Way

Oshkosh has hosted some of aviation's most iconic aircraft. In 2017, the newly restored Boeing B-29 "Doc" made its AirVenture debut after a decades-long rebuild, flying in formation with Fifi, the only other airworthy B-29 in the world. In 2005, SpaceShipOne, winner of the $10 million Ansari X Prize and the first privately built spacecraft to reach space, made its only public appearance at AirVenture, arriving with its White Knight carrier aircraft and staying the full week.

Interest in autonomous flight isn’t new at Oshkosh, either. At the International Federal Pavillion, the Air Force Research Laboratory has regularly showcased next-generation aircraft technology, including rapid prototyping of autonomous technology such as computer visions systems for autonomous navigation.

The event's roots as a homebuilders' meetup have never crowded out its military side. EAA Warbirds of America has anchored a dedicated Warbird Aircraft Area for decades, where 400 to 500 restored ex-military aircraft, including WWII fighters and bombers, Korean War and Vietnam-era jets among them, line up each year. The twice-daily Warbirds in Review program, spanning more than 80 years of military aviation heritage, pairs those aircraft with the veterans, restorers, and historians who kept them flying. It's the same flight line where photographer Mike Rollinger caught this SR-9 Stinson Reliant on the ramp in 2012, a reminder that Oshkosh's vintage civilian aircraft and its warbirds have always shared the same grass.

Growth has been steady and, more recently, record-breaking: AirVenture 2025 drew an estimated 704,000 attendees and more than 10,000 aircraft, with 962 commercial exhibitors, which are all-time highs for the event. EAA's own official Flickr photostream, with tens of thousands of images spanning recent years of the event, is a good place to watch that growth play out year over year.

What's Ahead for AirVenture 2026

This year's show runs July 20–26 at Wittman Regional Airport, and EAA has built the 2026 theme, "Celebrating the Freedom of Flight," around America's 250th anniversary. Expect programming tracing the aviation story from the Wright brothers to today, including a Pioneers of Flight display featuring the Seattle II, a replica of the Douglas World Cruiser that completed the first aerial circumnavigation of the globe in 1924.

Confirmed highlights include:

• The RAF Red Arrows

• NASA's Super Guppy

• The B-29 "Doc," back on the ramp where it made its restored debut in 2017

• The debut of the new EAA Vertical Lift Center

• Centennial tributes to Travel Air, Fairchild, and the Goodyear Blimp

Country artist Tyler Hubbard headlines a Theater in the Woods program on opening night, July 20, as part of a USAF tribute tied to the anniversary theme.

On July 21, Boeing Plaza turns into a showcase for where aviation is headed next, with innovation displays from many great companies - including us at Merlin:

• Airhart Aeronautics

• Amazon Delivery

• American Drone

• BETA Technologies

• Bye Aerospace

• Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University

• Jetson

• MagniX

• Starlight Productions

• Zipline

For Merlin, what makes Oshkosh unique, more than another industry event, is that it has always been where aviation’s past and future share the same flight line. As autonomy becomes part of that future, it’s the natural place to demonstrate technology built for the next generation of commercial and defense aviation.

More than seventy years after a handful of homebuilders gathered in Milwaukee, AirVenture remains aviation’s annual meeting place for ideas that reshape flight. Next up, Merlin’s team will share their experiences at the event and what Merlin is bringing to Oshkosh in 2026.