The Army Air Forces in World War II, Vol. 1 (archived PDF)

T H E A I R C O R P S P R E P A R E S F O R W A R , 1 9 3 9 - 4 1
aircraft production and training, suffered from lack of time and from
frequently enlarged objectives. Logically, the new installations should
have been built before the training program expanded; actually, for
want of time, the two processes went hand in hand. T h e rapid growth
in personnel encouraged drastic innovations in the traditional pattern
of military housing: hotels, warehouses, and other buildings were
leased or purchased, and arrangements were made to take over or
share commercial and municipal airport facilities. But in the mean-
while it was necessary to acquire new sites and to build new installa-
tions; as the Air Corps grew, new airfields mushroomed in every part
of the United States. Each new field involved a basic decision on the
question of temporary or permanent construction. Long-term needs
of the Air Corps and the sudden availability of funds in quantities
never before enjoyed argued, sometimes successfully, for substantial
buildings of concrete or brick; the pressure of time and the obviously
ephemeral nature of inflated requirements urged more rapid and less
pretentious construction. T h e solution varied from field to field, often
resulting in a compromise. T h e huge complex of fields around San
Antonio, for example, came to include every possible combination of
facilities ranging from the luxurious permanence of Randolph Field
to the heat-baked tar paper hutments of the Aviation Cadet Center;
from the huge shops and concrete ramps of Duncan Field to the cow-
pasture sod of auxiliary landing strips. O n Kelly Field alone, living
quarters included modernistic duplexes, permanent barracks, shacks
built during World W a r I, and a tent city. T h e general trend was
toward less substantial construction as the Air Corps grew beyond
any probable peacetime size and as it became increasingly obvious
that national resources in labor and construction material were not
unlimited.
This type of boom-time construction America understood; it re-
peated on a national scale a story which had been written in many an
oil field and engineering project. T h e chief emphasis again was on
speed. Personnel often moved into an air base long before completion
of even the most essential facilities. In such a case, training might be
conducted under canvas with construction proceeding on all sides,
the instructor in his lecture competing with the noise of hammers and
concrete mixers as well as of the ubiquitous trainer “buzzing” the
field. Flying would begin with the completion of a single runway.
Thereafter heavy construction equipment became a hazard to flying,
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