THE SOUTHERN ROUTE

Take a look at a US map that shows terrain features and you'll see that the east-west line defined by El Paso, Tucson, Yuma and San Diego follows relatively low elevations. This, along with fuel capacity and altitude limitations of early aircraft designs, is a big factor in why the Davis-Monthan Airfield was so popular a stopping place during the Golden Age of flight.

CHRONOLOGY OF THE DAVIS- MONTHAN AIRFIELD

The early Tucson airports occupied a couple of different geographical sites around the city in the 1920's. The timeline of changes is described in the references at left.

The location of the Davis-Monthan Airfield that is the subject of this website is currently in the northwest corner of the present Davis-Monthan Air Force Base (refer to the series of images below). At right is an early image of the airfield in its present location, probably before 1932, facing southwest. The present Davis-Monthan Air Force Base is toward the upper left and off the photo (image from DMAFB Office of Natural/Cultural Resources). Additional images of the early Airfield are available on this site at the Cosgrove Photograph and Document Collection.

Below, left, is an image of the airfield in 1936, just before the register record ends. North is toward the top of the image (both images courtesy of DMAFB Office of Natural/Cultural Resources). I added the property lines and dates.

At right is an identical image from 1954. Notice the changed geometries of runways and taxiways, some extending and following the same path as the old runway. Look closely and you'll see changes were also made to some of the buildings on the southwest border of the airfield.

In the aerial photo of the airfield above, left, the square, southernmost building, directly above the "9", is the Army Air Corps hangar built in 1932 by the WPA. It is a utilitarian, well-built structure, with sliding doors on the north and south sides, and a glass block facade on the northwest. This page (PDF 626KB), from the "Western Flyer" in 1931 tells of the plans and funding for the hangar (it also mentions other airfields near Tucson).

DETAILS OF BUILDINGS ON THE AIRFIELD IN THE 1930s

The image at left is cut from the image directly above it. It specifically identifies some of the structures on the field (courtesy of Mr. Thomas). At top is the location of staff homes. Al Hudgin, the FBO manager, and Dewey Simpson, the Airfield manager, rented homes (labeled "staff homes") on the west side of South Alvernon Way.

The American Airlines terminal, welcoming the Douglas sleepers and many movie stars, was located on the west border. The location of that building is now under some 50 feet of elevated roadway.

The approximate location of the Lindy Light (see newspaper references, right column) is shown, although there is conjecture as to its exact location. The "cottage" was allegedly the home of Dewey Simpson. However, Mr. Thomas and his resources agree that Mr. Simpson did not live in the cottage by the AAC hangar. See this link to the Cosgrove Photograph and Document Collection for ground level images of these structures that clarify their juxtaposition.

The nighttime image at right (taken in 1928), from the Arizona Daily Star in 1956, is of the large quonset-type hangar owned by the City of Tucson. Around the mid-30s, Al Hudgin rented this hangar and started his own business of aircraft maintenance and flight instruction. It was out of this hangar that Alan Thomas took his first airplane ride in a bright red Stinson, and then learned to fly with Mr. Hudgin as his instructor.

The final building is the Gilpin hangar. Before you read on, please link to C.W. Gilpin for some background on this building. This is the hangar built at the Airfield by ..... This image was taken after the building was moved to...

STILL WORKING ON THIS SECTION....

I HAVE AN IMAGE OF THE American Airlines TERMINAL COMING ALSO...

1932 HANGAR TODAY

The 1932 hangar stands today as we speak, and it is the subject of a move to make it a National Historic Landmark. We should all wish that endeavor well, not only for the obvious historic importance of the building, but also for the impact the people and airplanes that visited the Airfield made on the future of aviation.

The photo,left, of the southeastern face of the terminal, was taken in 2002. The wind was blowing on the day I took that photo. As it jostled and blew through the sliding hangar doors I could hear the sighs, gossip and whispers of a thousand pilot ghosts passing through the cracks, each recounting their flights long ago, and requesting their stories be told.

The concrete pad visible in the foreground was the floor of Al Hudgin's hangar SE of the terminal in the 1936 and 1954 photos.

At right is your webmaster at the glass block NE facade and entrance door of the 1932 hangar. Of the pilots and passengers you call from the dropdown menus, who landed after 1932, many passed through this door. As a pilot, standing there was powerful juju. You will understand this better as you further explore this Web site.

Left, above, inside the terminal you see the robust structure of the ceiling, with old-style slant out windows painted over, and porcelainized light reflectors. According to Mr. Thomas, Dewey Simpson, the airfield manager, stored extra wings for the Boeing P-26 in those rafters. That airplane was prone to ground loops and when it happened he always had a spare wing to mount.

Below, today the space is being used for Air Force Base storage, including what looks like a vertical stabilizer from an A-10.

To the right, a view of the 1932 hangar looking northwesterly. The old runway, a later asphalt version, is visible as a faint line running left to right at the lower half of this photo. The original checkerboard roof pattern has been replaced with text identifying Davis-Monthan Air Force Base active units.

GOLDEN AGE TRAFFIC AT THE AIRFIELD

Interesting is the report of traffic numbers cited by Reinhold (p. 97ff. in the reference top left column). For 1926, Reinhold reports 215 landings, with 185 landings made by military aircraft. The register database (query by year) yields 210 total landings, with 185 made by military pilots. Traffic for other years cited by Reinhold is more or less in agreement with the register and my database.

Regardless of the minor discrepancies, on average, by today's standards, airfield traffic was "relaxed". In the register, which lay for pilots to sign on a desk at the field between February 6, 1925 and November 26, 1936, we count 3,689 landings. This is just about one logged landing per day over the life of the register. But, when you go through the list of pilots and airplanes, quality certainly outshines quantity!

The graph of counts below (I know, it needs updating), extracted from my database, shows that traffic was by no means evenly distributed, especially for 1928 and 1929, just before the Great Depression.

It is clear, after Lindbergh dedicated the field in 1927 (see this link), traffic increased over three times annually. Unfortunately, aviation ran into the Great Depression and from 1929 on traffic dropped to about one airplane per week in the mid to late 30's. Maybe this is why the Register record stopped in 1936.

A slight majority of landings each year was made by military pilots. The Depression had about the same effect on civilian and military aviation alike.

THE DAVIS-MONTHAN AIRFIELD TODAY

Below are two aerial photographs I took as I was vectored toward Tucson International Airport for landing. I have outlined very roughly the location of the original airfield as it is positioned in the northwest corner of the Davis-Monthan Air Force Base. Photo below from the northeast with the runways of Tucson International (TUS) labeled in the background.

Closer in, looking southwest past the leading edge of my left wing. The 1932 hangar building is visible as the white structure on the property line. The concrete pad of the Hudgin hangar is visible just to the left of it. A faint shadow of the original runway can be seen in the lower right quadrant of the image (not the taxiways, but a really faint shadow that runs through the apex of the two taxiways).

Finally, I offer a treat below of the approach plate used during the 1940s for the AN range let down at the Davis Monthan Air Force Base. I leave the image writ large so you can enjoy the similarities between this early notation and our contemporary approach plates. Some things change; some things remain the same. Image courtesy of Alan Thomas.

RECENT PRESS COVERAGE FOR THE AIRFIELD

The following is quoted from the Tucson Citizen of Tuesday, December 16, 2003 (from part II of a three-part series written by C.T. Revere).

"....There was a time when Tucson's military presence was a one-man outfit.

In 1925, two years before Davis-Monthan Airfield came to be, the U.S. Air Service dispatched Army Staff Sgt. Dewey Simpson to Tucson to set up a refueling station for transcontinental flights that landed at the remote desert outpost.

Simpson's one-man post was set up at the Tucson Municipal Flying Field, now the Tucson Rodeo Grounds.

His first customer, Simpson told the Tucson Daily Citizen, was Jimmy Doolittle, who later led a U.S. bombing raid on Tokyo in response to the attack on Pearl Harbor [Note: the first signature in the Register is that of Al Gilhousen. Perhaps Doolittle visited first, but did not sign the Register]..

Two years later, Simpson's refueling station was moved to the city's municipal airport, which was renamed Davis-Monthan Field in honor of pilots Samuel Davis and Oscar Monthan, both Tucsonans who died in plane crashes after World War I.

The dedication ceremony Sept. 23, 1927, was a day of hoopla and celebration featuring a visit by America's most famous flier, Charles Lindbergh, just four months after he became the first pilot to fly solo across the Atlantic Ocean.

An estimated crowd of 20,000 people - nearly the entire population of Tucson - turned out to greet the aviation hero and see him throw the switch on a large rotating beacon called the "Lindy Light."

Davis-Monthan and Tucson continued to grow at a sluggish pace through the late 1920s and into the Depression.

In 1930, the city was home to 32,506 people, and D-M featured a crew of three men. A weather and radio station for the post was still a year away from construction.

Ten years later, Tucson was home to 37,763 and America still a distant observer of the war in Europe. Davis-Monthan, with a crew of 25 enlisted men, was designated an Army Air Base in 1941.

After the United States was drawn into World War II, Davis-Monthan became a training station for medium-range bombers and was equipped with B-18s and B-25s.

As the war progressed, the focus on the base shifted to training crews for heavy bombers and D-M eventually trained nearly 20,000 crew members for B-24 "Liberator" bombers.

By 1944, the B-24s were replaced by B-29 "Superfortress" bombers, with crews trained at D-M.

After the war ended, the newly created Air Force chose D-M as home for the 4105th Army Air Force Unit, which was charged with storage and maintenance for military aircraft left over from the war.

The storage facility, now called the Aerospace Maintenance and Regeneration Center, is home to more than 4,200 military aircraft, some of which are ready for use and others used for spare parts.

During the years since World War II, D-M has been a training site for pilots and crews of numerous aircraft, including the F-86A "Sabre," and the A-7 "Corsair II."

In 1976, D-M became the training base for the A-10 "Thunderbolt II," which showed its meddle in the Persian Gulf War and more recently in Operation Enduring Freedom and Operation Iraqi Freedom.

In 1980, another plane common in the Tucson skies joined the complement at D-M - the EC-130 "Hercules."

The giant cargo plane is now used as a flying battlefield command post and for jamming enemy communications. It also is used in support of D-M's newest addition, the Combat Air Rescue Group, along with HH-60 Pave Hawk helicopters.

David Taylor, a city planning administrator, said Tucson would be a very different place without Davis-Monthan.

"If we had been bypassed by the Great War's training effort, it's totally hypothetical, but I think we would be a fraction of our current size," he said.

"We would not have grown a lot between the turn of the century and the 1940s and I don't know what would have driven our growth in the years after World War II.""

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UPLOADED: 04/29/05 REVISED: 12/08/05, 01/23/06 INCOMPLETE