Fort Crowder - The Space Age

The Space Age

With Short's defeat in the 1956 election, the fort lost its legislative patron and was deactivated again in 1958. As that took place, about 2,000 acres (8.1 km2) of the post was turned over to the U.S. Air Force as a buffer zone around Air Force Plant 65, a government owned-contractor operated liquid propelled rocket engine manufacturing facility operated by the Rocketdyne division of North American Aviation. The complex, serviced by a spur of the Kansas City Southern Railroad, included a main manufacturing facility, an engine testing area (ETA) for the live fire testing of rocket engines, a component testing area (CTA), and a former Camp Crowder warehouse, Building 900, as a warehouse and later engine overhaul and manufacturing.

For 16 years, starting in 1957, rocket engines for missiles such as the Atlas, Thor and Saturn were assembled and tested at Air Force Plant 65. The facility constructed and tested engines for the Mercury and Gemini programs until its contract ended in 1968.

The permanent barracks, were obtained as surplus and formed the core of the community college campus for Crowder College in 1962.