Sheppard Air Force Base

Gen. Rush B. Lincoln, head of the Air Corps technical training schools, was drawn to the flat pastureland north of the city, and construction ran from June 12 to October 17, 1941, under Col. Edward C. Black. In the last year of the war Sheppard was the nation's only helicopter-pilot school. While it stood inactive, the National Guard used twenty buildings and others went to Wichita General and Midwestern hospitals. Later the base trained West German pilots and, from 1965 to 1971, South Vietnamese helicopter pilots, and in 1966 it gained the Air Force Medical Service School.

What the plaque says

In July 1940, the U.S. Army Air Corps evaluated Call Field, a former World War I flight training base, as a potential site for a technical training school. That site was not available. However, Kell Field was a viable alternative and the local chamber of commerce led an effort to purchase tracts of land adjoining Kell Field. On April 17, 1941, the new installation was named Sheppard Field, in honor of U.S. Senator Morris Sheppard, who had died eight days earlier. On June 19, 1941, the War Department approved a dual training mission for Sheppard Field. Along with its Aviation Mechanics School, Sheppard also served as a basic training center. After the U. S. entered World War II on December 7, 1941, the frequency and length of training classes continued to grow dramatically to accommodate thousands of aviation mechanics. In September 1942, Sheppard Field received a Glider Mechanic School and later started a glider classification school for pilots. This was followed by the airfield's first flight training courses in 1944. In October 1945, Sheppard Field reached a peak strength of 46,000 personnel, while serving as an Army Air Forces separation center. On August 31, 1946, the War Department placed Sheppard on inactive status. Nearly two years later, on August 1, 1948, Sheppard Field opened again in response to the Cold War, becoming a permanent air force base two years later. In 1955, the U.S. Air Force made Sheppard the primary training center for the Atlas Ballistic Missile System. The base also became the prime center for the Jupiter and Thor intermediate range ballistic missiles, as well as the Titan Intercontinental ballistic missile until the mid-1980s. Additional Cold War missions included a B-52 bomber wing of the strategic air command, a helicopter flying training air training command, and the Euro-Nato Joint Jet Pilot Training (ENJJPT) program. 175 Years of Texas Independence * 1836-2011

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• World's Littlest Skyscraper — 3.7 mi
  A four-story brick tower in downtown Wichita Falls, 40 feet tall and 10 feet wide, the leftover of a 1919 oil-boom office deal in which, the story goes, investors misread inches as feet.
• Kell House Museum — 4.0 mi
  The 1909 Classic Revival house of Frank Kell, the miller and railroad builder who helped make Wichita Falls a city, shown by guided tour with its family furniture still in place.
• Lake Arrowhead State Park — 16 mi
  A prairie park on the north shore of the Wichita Falls water-supply lake, which drowned the town of Halsell in 1965-66, with mesquite campsites, a lighted pier and more than 200 bird species.
• Clay County 1890 Jail Museum — 21 mi
  Henrietta's 1890 stone jail a block from the domed courthouse, now the county museum, with its original cells, a gallows that was never used and the sheriff's family quarters.

More markers nearby

• Joseph Sterling Bridwell — 3.2 mi
• Kemp, Joseph Alexander — 3.6 mi
• Kell, Frank — 3.6 mi
• Site of St. James Hotel — 3.7 mi