Page 36 - South Mississippi Living - July, 2016

KEESLER AFB making history
HAPPY ANNIVERSARY
Keesler Air Force Base celebrates 75 years
story by Kenneth Dodd, 81Training Wing Historical Of ce and Senior Airman Duncan McElroy, 81st Training Wing Public Affairs photos courtesy of KAFB
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request by coastal leadership. In 1939, city leaders attempted to convince the War Department that Biloxi would
be an ideal place for pilot training. However, a year later, they were notified that a coastal town was not the best location for a training facility for fear of attack by enemy naval forces.
In late 1940, the Army Air Corps Technical School headquarters announced plans to activate two new training bases which would specialize in aircraft mechanics training. After being turned down in 1939, Biloxi officials were determined that one
of the new training bases be located at the city’s airport. They met with Technical School officials to negotiate a land transfer for a technical training school. With several changes to the number of personnel to be stationed at the school and the acquisition of
additional land, the War Department notified Biloxi’s mayor that the city had been selected as the site of a new technical training school on March 6, 1941.
Biloxi and the Veterans Administration transferred the 832- acre site which included three golf courses, the Biloxi Airport, the Naval Reserve Park, and some private property to the Army Air Corps. The War Department activated Army
Air Corps Station No. 8, Aviation Mechanics School, on June 12, 1941, and by June 1942, most of the barracks, academic buildings and support facilities were completed.
The Army Air Corps Station No. 8 was renamed Keesler Army Air Field on Aug. 25, 1941 in honor of 2nd Lt. Samuel Reeves Keesler Jr., a native of Greenwood, Miss.
On Oct. 8, 1918, Lt. Keesler, an aerial
Ithink the most significant thing
I did during my military career was in 1973,” recalls retired Chief Master Sgt. Lonnie Arnold. “Troops returning from Vietnam were delivered here
and it was our job to help repatriate them; get them settled into lodging, link them back with their wives and kids, make sure they felt welcome.”
Throughout the past 75 years, Keesler Air Force Base and its surrounding community have been home to many things — significant events, units,
and missions. Where a 1930s-era baseball field once sat, a flight line and C-130Js capable of global weather reconnaissance and tactical airlift now reside, along with a state-of-the- art training campus and living and working facilities for 12,000 Airmen and civilians.
Keesler’s creation came from a
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