The museum was founded in 1975 as the Aero Space Museum Association of Calgary by aviation enthusiasts and former World War II pilots. It built upon the history of an earlier private collection called the Air Museum of Canada. The museum moved to its current location in a former British Commonwealth Air Training Plan hangar in 1985.[1]
A renovation was carried out in 2016 that included replacing the roof and installing a new HVAC system. That same year, the museum changed its name to The Hangar Flight Museum.[2]
Following a seven-year restoration, the museum's Hawker Hurricane returned in 2019.[3] Earlier that year, it began restoring its CF-100.[4]
The museum's annex, a building used to store aircraft from its collection, had its fabric roof badly damaged in a windstorm in March 2023. This was the second time the building had been damaged by weather. The museum is engaged in fundraising to construct a new museum building.[5][6][7]
A central War memorial stone slab and four other memorial slabs were erected by the Aircrew Association (Southern Alberta Branch) and the Aero Space Museum Association of Calgary. The plaque name the commonwealth air forces who trained in Calgary as part of the British Commonwealth Air Training Plan during the Second World War: Royal Canadian Air Force (RCAF); Royal Air Force (RAF); Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF); Royal New Zealand Air Force (RNZAF). In front of the slabs, a gravel mural of a Canadian roundel was painted.[9]
The Aero Space Museum Association of Calgary erected a list of honour memorial dedicated to the Alberta Airmen who were killed in the Second World War.[10]