Anthony Marquez of The Detail Pros in Rancho Cucamonga recently returned from Seattle, where he was part of a team that performed maintenance on the presidential plane, Air Force One, which is on display at the Museum of Flight.

According to a press release, this was Marquez’s first visit to the Museum of Flight as a member of the Air Force One Detailing Team, which performs annual maintenance on the aircraft.

The Air Force One presidential plane and a dozen other historic aircraft are on display in the museum’s open-air aircraft pavilion, which means they are exposed to Seattle’s humid climate.

The Air Force One Detailing Team spent ten years restoring the plane’s paint and brightwork. In recent years, the team has focused on maintaining and protecting that work.

The museum’s Air Force One jet, which was flown by Presidents Eisenhower, Kennedy, Johnson and Nixon, requires an annual no-rinse wash to knock dirt from the surface, followed by a soft microfiber cloth to remove streaks. It’s finished with a surface protectant that lasts six months.

Marquez also worked on the restoration and preservation of several other historic aircraft at the Seattle museum, including polishing the fuselage and tail of a World War II B-29 bomber, which were made entirely of aluminum.

Anthony Marquez of The Detail Pros in Rancho Cucamonga works on an airplane at Seattle’s Museum of Flight in July 2024 as a member of the Air Force One Detailing Team. (Courtesy of The Detail Mafia)

Anthony Marquez of The Detail Pros in Rancho Cucamonga polishes a World War II bomber at Seattle’s Museum of Flight in July 2024 as a member of the Air Force One Detailing Team. (Courtesy of The Detail Mafia)

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Anthony Marquez of The Detail Pros in Rancho Cucamonga works on an airplane at Seattle’s Museum of Flight in July 2024 as a member of the Air Force One Detailing Team. (Courtesy of The Detail Mafia)

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“It hadn’t been polished in years and the aluminum was so deteriorated that you couldn’t tell it was shiny anymore,” Marquez said in the press release. “By the time we finished polishing it, it was like a mirror.”

He also cleaned a recently restored World War II B-17 Flying Fortress bomber, ground and polished the underside of the very first Boeing 727, and cleaned and protected the sides and wings of a 1978 Concorde on loan from British Airways, the press release said.

“This was my first year on the team, but it’s something I aspired to as a member of Detail Mafia,” Marquez said in the press release. “It was a lot of fun, but above all it’s an important responsibility. It gives me a higher level of skill in terms of polishing paint and brightwork (metal) and that’s an advantage for my local customers.”

The Air Force One aircraft at the museum is a Boeing 707-120 Special Air Missions jet known as SAM 970. It has served not only presidents, but also VIPs such as Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev and U.S. Secretary of State Henry Kissinger. It also brought President John F. Kennedy to Dallas on the day he was assassinated, the press release said.

The project leader, Renny Doyle of Detailing Success in Big Bear Lake, began restoring the plane 21 years ago when the museum acquired it. With a team of fewer than a dozen detailers, Doyle wasn’t sure they could save the plane’s deteriorating paint, but he was confident he could stop the damage and restore the plane’s aluminum brightwork, the news release said.

After Doyle assembled an annual team with the expertise needed for museum projects, it took nearly a decade to fully restore both the paint and brightwork. At about the same time, the Museum of Flight built a covered but open-air pavilion that now houses Air Force One and a dozen other historic aircraft.

Marquez, who is certified by the International Detailing Association and Doyle’s Detailing Success, is also a member of the Detail Mafia, a team of auto detailers in the United States. He and other members of the team donate their time and skills to the project.