Goodfellow Air Force Base

Goodfellow Field 1943 Classbook

The peace that arrived two months later endured a mere two decades more. Constrained by neutrality legislation, but witness to the aggression across Europe, Africa, and Asia, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt began a program of preparedness that included the construction of facilities dedicated to advanced air training. Several such bases were envisioned for Texas and one, specifically, for the Fort Worth-Midland-San Angelo triangle. Civic leaders from San Angelo immediately commended their community to the U.S. War Department. A generous offer of sewage and electrical service, a railroad spur, and a 50-year lease on 640 acres (260 ha) at one dollar per year easily decided the issue.

Construction of the new San Angelo Air Corps Basic Flying School began at once. Officially established on 17 August 1940, the base was ready for occupancy by 21 January 1941, and the first classes of students soon arrived. On 11 June 1941, in dedication to a young hero and in tribute to the community that shaped him, the base was officially renamed Goodfellow Field.

In the next four years, more than 10,000 trained pilots were graduated, and many were decorated for outstanding heroism in action against Germany, Italy, and Japan.

Still, the Axis collapse did not dissolve the Goodfellow mission. The contingent there continued to train pilots into the postwar era, primarily for large, multiengine piston and turboprop aircraft, first on the AT-6 Texan, the T-28 Trojan, and then, beginning in 1954, on the twin-engine TB-25 and B-25 Mitchell. On 3 September 1958, with nearly 20,000 aviators to its credit, Goodfellow graduated its last class of pilots, as the Air Force and Air Training Command (ATC) transitioned to the new Undergraduate Pilot Training construct with T-37 and T-38 Talon aircraft that required minimum 8000-ft (2400-m) runway lengths, far longer than Goodfellow's 5500-ft primary runways.

With the transfer of the base from ATC to the USAF Security Service (USAFSS), Goodfellow's mission became the training of Air Force personnel in the advanced cryptologic skills that the USAFSS required. Eight years later, in 1966, the mission expanded further to include joint-service training in these same skills for U.S. Army, U.S. Navy, and U.S. Marine Corps personnel.

Although flight operations at Goodfellow decreased dramatically after 1958, minimal activities continued with both transient aircraft and locally based Cessna U-3 Administrators (1958–1971), DeHavilland U-6 Beavers (1960–1966), Piasecki H-21, CH-21, and HH-21 Workhorse helicopters (1958–1966), and Cessna O-2 Skymasters (1972–1975). Goodfellow's runways were permanently closed in March 1975.[1]

After 38 years of pilot and then intelligence training, Goodfellow's mission had apparently come to a close with the announcement in 1978 that the base would revert to ATC and was a candidate for closure. Since it was a single-mission facility, its mission could perhaps be executed more economically elsewhere.

By then, senior intelligence personnel had already begun seriously to contemplate the consolidation of all Air Force-managed intelligence training at one location. The site selected for intelligence training consolidation was Goodfellow, and the base was designated a technical training center on 1 March 1985.

During the next three years, intelligence training consolidation brought to Goodfellow advanced imagery training from Offutt Air Force Base, Nebraska; electronic intelligence operations training from Keesler Air Force Base, Mississippi; and targeting, intelligence applications, and general intelligence training from Lowry Air Force Base, Colorado, as a result of Lowry's identification for closure under Base Realignment and Closure (BRAC). The successful completion of intelligence training consolidation on 30 June 1988 further facilitated the development of intelligence training integration, a multidisciplinary approach to the training of intelligence professionals.

In 1992, as part of an overall organizational restructuring of the Air Force, ATC was inactivated, replaced by the Air Education and Training Command, which became the "parent" major command for Goodfellow AFB.

On 1 July 1993, the 17th Training Wing was activated on Goodfellow AFB. With the change in name came a marked diversification and increase in Goodfellow's mission. Rounds one and two of the BRAC process transferred special instruments training from the former Lowry AFB and fire protection training from the former Chanute Air Force Base, Illinois, to Goodfellow. To support the increased training load, Goodfellow underwent extensive modernization and growth. With new training facilities, dormitories, dining halls, a commissary,[2] a youth center, and a physical fitness center.

On February 18, 1995 Louis Jones, Jr., kidnapped Private Tracie McBride from Goodfellow AFB before raping and murdering her.[3]