Black Wings Children’s Museum Support
Hefflin Legacy Foundation is dedicated to continuing the support of the Black Wings Children’s Museum. HLF sponsors science events during the annual Open House, supports events during the Anniversary of its opening, and continues to inspire young people with science academies. These activities are built on the foundation of personality characteristics that Leon Hefflin demonstrated as an African-American entrepreneur.
The Black Wings Children’s Museum was officially opened on 10/10/12, the same week the Space Shuttle was delivered to the California Science Center and was featured on Channel 4. The founder and lead of this project was Deborah Swan, who won a grant from UCLA to empower the staff development of teachers by strengthening the mandate of the Windsor Hills Math, Science, and Aerospace Magnet. The team, which included Jocelyn Johnson and Stephanie Sharif, created a proposal to create a museum on campus to showcase African-American contributions to aerospace. The vision of this project came from the experience Leon Hefflin’s granddaughter, the founder of HFL, had as one of the first African-American engineers to work on the first Space Shuttle at Rockwell International.