The McCook Army Air Base

Like all communities in Nebraska and throughout the U.S., McCook did its part in helping the United States win World War II, in providing its young men and women for service in the Armed Forces, in tightening its collective belt in conserving scarce commodities, and buying its share (and more) of war bonds.

In addition, McCook was chosen as the location for one of the 11 Army Air Bases in Nebraska to be constructed during the war. This meant there would be a huge adjustment for McCook citizens. who turned basements, garages, and spare rooms into quarters for service men and their families, who arrived in McCook from all over the U.S.

The site that the Army chose for the Air Base was a 2,100-acre tract north and west of McCook. The base was organized into three main divisions; the 520th Base Headquarters and Air Base Squadron, the Bomb Groups, and detachments of the 23rd Medical, and 23rd Airways Communication Squadrons, made up of units mostly out of Pueblo, Colorado, and enlisted men from the Kearney Army Air Base, at Kearney, Neb.

The Base Mission, originally, was to train crews to provide the final training for crews of B-24 Liberator bombers, prior to taking those bombers overseas. Later, crews trained to handle the B-17 Flying Fortresses for service in the European Theater and Africa, and as World War II was entering its final phase, B-29 Super Fortress bombers headed for the Pacific in the war against Japan.

At McCook, the crews were trained in celestial navigation, gunnery, bombing communications, radar, and aircraft maintenance.

Two of the runways at the base were 7,525 feet long, a third was 7,454 feet long. All three were 150 feet wide. The runways formed a triangle, the base running due east and west. The runways, taxiways, apron and standing areas were paved with concrete, seven inches thick, with thickened edges, 10 inches thick -- designed to withstand a wheel load of 60,000 pounds.

There were four original base hangars. One measured 210 by 202 feet, with a 168 foot high door. Three of the hangars were 202 by 115 feet, with 168 foot high doors for the planes.

The McCook Army Air Base was not in operation very long -- only from the middle of July, 1943, until the war ended, in the summer of 1945, but during those two years it was a very busy place indeed.

In addition to the units actually engaged in training combat crews, the Air Base was home to a number of other units. There was the Medical Unit, with its own base hospital, the Veterinary Service, the 431st Army Air Force Band, the 3rd Weather Region (a part of the 23rd Airways Communication), the 902nd Quartermaster Co., the Chemical Warfare Detachment, and the Finance Detachment. The base had its own theater, gymnasium, fire station, post office, photo lab, library, and Military Police. By the end of 1944 some 110 buildings and structures had been built on the base.

Housing at the Air Base was a problem for the entire time of its existence. At first, the military men, who came to McCook to create the Air Base lived in what was described as "Tent City, until barracks could be constructed. For the entire two years, new quarters for officers and men were continually being built on the base, which eventually was home to some 15,000 officers and men, plus some 500 civilian workers. Many of the officers and men, and their families were forced to live in McCook. Some accommodations created for the newcomers in McCook were marginal, at best, but other military families fared very well, when prominent McCook families opened their homes to offer spare rooms, or basement or garage apartments to military personnel, many times forming life-long friendships with their new guests.

When McCook got the news that the city would be the site of a new Air Base, other communities began calling, warning the city that they should beef up their police force, as there was going to be increased trouble in town, caused by the new military presence. McCook City Councilman, Claude Addams, said in an interview, "We decided to wait to see what would happen. We have not added one extra policeman to our force because of the Air Base!"

However, getting military personnel, and a large civilian worker population who lived in McCook to and from the Air Base was a real problem. In 1943, conditions on the winding 11 mile road to the base were bad -- it was difficult to see because of the dust when dry, muddy, to cause breakdowns when it was rainy. The first bus used was a little old red school bus, which ran infrequently, but regularly broke down en-route. Passengers commonly had to push the bus out of a trouble spot.

The story goes that the bus mechanic regularly waited at the bus terminal (railway depot), "I know they will call me anyway." Over time, dust problems and rutty roads were overcome, to a certain extent, by oiling the road to the Air Base.

There were continuing difficulties with facilities, equipment shortages, manpower, both civilian and military, and coordination with the Army and Washington officials, which required a good bit of imaginative adjustment for Air Base officials, yet the training of crews and ground personnel went on quite smoothly, and the Air Base rated Superior in numerous inspections.

A Gazette reporter was invited to witness a training exercise for Base fire fighters, designed to familiarize the service group "smoke eaters" against the day that they would have to fight real aircraft fires. "Carl Skoog, air base fire chief, started the fireworks by throwing a lighted match into a pool of oil topped by a layer of 73-octane gasoline. Eight firemen, on four water-spray handlines, advanced to the brink of the pit, sweeping the flames before them.

"Two water trucks were behind pushing fire-foam out of each nozzle at the rate of 60 gallons per minute. Within nine seconds the fire had been quenched.

"After six more runs with the relatively small Class 125 and Class 135 fire trucks, the mammoth $38,000 Cardox truck was moved up for action. The robot-like truck was the latest thing in AAF fire-fighting equipment and was 14 feet high, 35 feet long, and weighed 4,560 pounds. Within 48 seconds, three tons of 130 degrees-below-zero CO2 frost was put on the fire. The Cardox, which looked like a huge shower bath on wheels, was steered by compressed air."

With so many crews training in so many airplanes, the safety record at McCook Air Base was remarkably good. However, inevitable disasters did occur.

Bombing training missions took crews quite a distance from McCook. On one such mission, in May, 1944, a gunnery/bombing run near Scottsbluff, a novice pilot flew his B-24 Liberator Bomber into the side of a hill, killing six members of the crew from McCook Air Base. The only other documented crash occurred on April 10, 1945, when a large bomber went down near Maywood, taking the lives of five crew members. Four more of the crew were injured. Five escaped unscathed.

With the Japanese surrender, in August 1945, the Army set about to close most of its air bases. The McCook Air Base would close on Dec. 31, 1945. Most of the 1800 officers and men still stationed at McCook were either discharged or assigned to other bases, leaving just one officer, Col Lewis Lyle and a skeleton crew, of 42 , to shut down the base.

Several sales helped to eliminate the masses of accumulated equipment, including PX equipment, furniture, and office equipment. Most of the base vehicles were shipped to Denver for sale there. Some of the base equipment was sent to other bases, and some stored in McCook.

It was a grateful U.S. Army that left McCook at war's end -- pleased with the effort, cooperation, and good will that the city had given to the Air Base in those turbulent times.

When Col. Lyle prepared to leave McCook and the Air Base on Jan. 15, 1946 he made a public address. "I wish to take the opportunity to thank the residents of McCook for the many services they have rendered to the Army personnel who have been stationed here.

"Those services included the housing bureau operated by the Chamber of Commerce, the downtown Servicemen Center, donation of the ballpark for the men stationed here, and many other services. Speaking for all personnel at the air base, I wish to thank everyone in McCook for your cooperation during the war and since VJ Day."

-- Source: Gazette Centennial Edition 1982; World War II Nebraska Army Airfields