History
The airport was originally constructed at a cost of $10 million as a U.S. Army Air Forces base during World War II, opening in 1941 under the name Baer Field and later Baer Army Air Field. During wartime, over 100,000 military personnel served out of Baer Field and its more than 100 structures. The principal units at the installation were the First Troop Carrier Group and the 45th Army Air Force Base Unit. By the end of World War II, the city of Fort Wayne bought the airport from the federal government's General Services Administration for the price of $1, renaming it Fort Wayne Municipal Airport in 1946.
Under the management of the Fort Wayne/Allen County Airport Authority since 1985, the airport was renamed Fort Wayne International Airport in 1991. Through the 1990s, the airport underwent the largest expansion and revitalization in its history, with an expanded and updated terminal designed by MSKTD & Associates, Inc., runway upgrades, and the establishment of the Air Trade Center on the southwest side of the property. In 2006, a modernized 210 feet (64 m) air traffic control tower was opened on the south side of the airport, at a price of $9.7 million.
Located in the Lieutenant Paul Baer Terminal, the Greater Fort Wayne Aviation Museum recounts early aviation history in Northeastern Indiana.
Read more about this topic: Fort Wayne International Airport
Famous quotes containing the word history:
“It is the true office of history to represent the events themselves, together with the counsels, and to leave the observations and conclusions thereupon to the liberty and faculty of every man’s judgement.”
—Francis Bacon (1561–1626)
“Boys forget what their country means by just reading “the land of the free” in history books. Then they get to be men, they forget even more. Liberty’s too precious a thing to be buried in books.”
—Sidney Buchman (1902–1975)
“Bias, point of view, fury—are they ... so dangerous and must they be ironed out of history, the hills flattened and the contours leveled? The professors talk ... about passion and point of view in history as a Calvinist talks about sin in the bedroom.”
—Catherine Drinker Bowen (1897–1973)