Lake Bridgeport WWII Training Site

The lake the Navy borrowed was built for water. The Handbook of Texas says it was completed in December 1931 for about $2 million as part of the proposed Trinity River canalization plan, and is owned by the Tarrant County Water Control and Improvement District Number 1. With Eagle Mountain Lake and Lake Worth it controls floodwaters on the West Fork. It covers some 10,400 acres, and stored water serves city, industrial and farm use. The dam spared western Wise County farmland from seasonal flooding and drew development at Runaway Bay, Lakevue Estates and Lake Bridgeport.

What the plaque says

Lake Bridgeport WWII Training Site When the U.S. was drawn into World War II in 1941 the federal government increased the number of training facilities across the nation. The area around Lake Bridgeport (built in 1931) made for an ideal site to train airmen and test equipment without undue impact on local residents. Lake Bridgeport served as an important military training site, designated as a bombing target area and auxiliary sea plane base for Eagle Mountain Lake Marine Corps Air Station (Tarrant County). Construction occurred generally in the northeast corner of the lake's main body in September 1942, with an administration building, boathouse, seaplane ramp and parking, the 'east hill stone target,' and various floating targets. The site also hosted training and research activities including: amphibious troop gliders, night and day fighter-machine gun strafing, skip and dive bombing, and test area for the tdr (an early u.s. navy radio controlled assault drone.) Hundreds of U.S. Navy and Marine Aviation Pilots and Crewmen trained here. In tragic accidents during training in 1944, two marine aviators, lt. T. S. Wharton, Jr. And CPL A. J. Paleszewski, and later, a local guard, Thomas Troy Mitchum, died. Bombing runs were conducted daily at 10:30 a.m., 2:30 p.m. and 4:55 p.m., while night bombings could occur at any hour. Area-lit by magnesium flares suspended under parachutes, these flares would occasionally ignite a landowner's pasture, which brought out neighbors to help extinguish the flames. Lake Bridgeport, as an auxiliary training site for Eagle Mountain Lake AIr Sation, provided valuable maneuvering room for aviators during the war. Both sites ceased operations after the war. (2015)

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Wise County Courthouse — 16 mi
  J. Riely Gordon's granite Romanesque courthouse of 1895-96 in Decatur, built after fire destroyed the Second Empire courthouse and set off a fight over the county seat.
• Fort Richardson State Park and Historic Site — 17 mi
  The northernmost post of the Texas frontier line, outside Jacksboro, where a stone hospital and six other buildings stand from 1867 and a later Guard unit became the Lost Battalion.
• Lake Mineral Wells State Park and Trailway — 27 mi
  A Cross Timbers park on the old Camp Wolters grounds, built around a 1922 water-supply lake for a spa town, with Penitentiary Hollow's rock climbing and a 20-mile trailway.

More markers nearby

• Hyde Cemetery — 2.7 mi
• Toll Bridge & Old Bridgeport — 4.7 mi
• Bridgeport Coal Mines — 6.3 mi
• Hunt, Col. William Hudson — 6.7 mi