AUBURN – Germany’s national airline aims to lift a derelict antique airplane from Auburn to its rightful place in the sky.

Executives from Lufthansa cut the ribbon on the project Thursday, gathered beneath a wing of the 51-year-old Lockheed Super Constellation in a just-completed hangar at the Auburn-Lewiston Municipal Airport.

“Finally, starting today, my dreams are happening,” said Maurice Roundy of Auburn. For two decades the plane and a twin sat next to his airport-side home. “We held out to the point of bankruptcy.”

Roundy sold the Auburn pair and a third Constellation in Florida to Lufthansa at auction last December. The price was $748,000.

The one in Florida was once owned by Lufthansa, sometimes flying top West German officials around the world. It likely will be used for parts, along with the other Auburn plane.

A nonprofit arm of the German carrier, Deutsche Lufthansa Berlin-Siftung, plans to fly the propeller-driven plane within two years. Within three years, the company hopes it will resemble the Super Constellations that launched its premiere service in the 1950s.

The plane would then travel the world as a once-in-a-lifetime showpiece, giving rides to people who want the experience of air travel before jet engines.

The plane flew as “the technical culmination of long-range, piston-powered aircraft,” said August Wilhelm Henningsen, chairman of the executive board of Lufthansa Technik.

“We are very excited that the real work can start now,” he said.

Of course, the work began months ago, when Michael Austermeier of Lufthansa arrived in Auburn last April. He brought three mechanics.

Together, they began the tedious process of cataloging every piece of Roundy’s airplanes and some accompanying bins holding a mixture of aircraft parts and household odds and ends.

“We had no tools, no hangar, no nothing,” Austermeier said. He and his crew removed every gauge and switch from the cockpit and took away every piece of furniture, including the pilot’s seat. And with some temporary help, they took off the engines.

A company in Grangeville, Idaho, is rebuilding four engines for the plane. The characteristic wing-of-its-own tail section was sent to Tulsa, Okla., for restoration at a Lufthansa subsidiary.

Getting the fuselage ready and the installation of a new, modern cockpit will take place in Auburn in a new $3 million hangar. The 50,000-square-foot hangar was funded by the airport and developer George Schott.

It was completed one week ago, said Rick Cloutier, manager of the Auburn-Lewiston Municipal Airport.

Lufthansa workers – including 12 local people hired for the project – parked the antique plane in the heated hangar on Wednesday.

To Didi Krauss, a Lufthansa pilot for 36 years, the scene was beautiful and rare.

Between 1956 and 1958, Lockheed built 44 of the Super Constellations, which the Germans renamed “Super Stars.”

“I still love it,” said Krauss, who crewed aboard Super Stars when he graduated from flight school. “The design is still the best there ever was, like a dolphin.”

Krauss eventually tallied about 3,000 hours in the plane.

He hopes one day to take the wheel of the restored plane, if only for a few minutes during a training flight.

He’s already listening for the sound of the engines.

“It’s beautiful,” he said. “Hypnotic.”