Buckley Air Force Base
From Biocrawler, the free encyclopedia.
Buckley Air Force Base is a United States Air Force base located east of Denver, Colorado.
History
During the early years of World War II the city of Denver purchased a parcel of land and donated it to the Department of the Army. The site was named Buckley Field after 1st Lt. John Harold Buckley, a Longmont, Colorado native, who lost his life while on a strafing mission behind enemy lines on the September 17, 1918.
Construction on the base began in early 1942. Buckley Field would accept and train over 50,000 airmen in initial basic training. The Army Air Corps Technical Training School at Buckley consisted of bombardier and armorer training for aircrews on the B-17 Fortress and B-24 Liberator bombers.
In 1946, the Colorado Air National Guard assumed control of Buckley.
The Department of the Navy took charge of Buckley Field in 1947 and renamed the base, Naval Air Station-Denver, Colorado. The renamed base now housed veterans and their families waiting to revert back to civilian life. Thousands of veterans transitioned back to civilian life over the next fours years until 1951. The Navy continued to operate and maintain the base until 1959 when it was decommissioned reverted back to Air Force ownership.
Licensed by the Air Force to the state of Colorado in 1960, for the next forty years the base remained, Buckley Air National Guard Base.
In 1997, Air Force Space Command stood up the 821st Space Group on Buckley.
External Links
- Buckley Air Force Base (http://www.buckley.af.mil/)
- Buckley AFB History Reference (http://www.buckley.af.mil/docs/heritage/BuckHisSend.doc)
