| By SETH TUPPER
The Daily Republic
What today is the Mitchell Municipal Airport was once Mitchell Army Air Base.
Few visible reminders are left from the facility's World War II-era operations, but several stories live on.
There is an unconfirmed rumor that Jimmy Stewart, the actor-turned-airman, landed his bomber at the base during a training flight.
The Norden bombsight, considered top-secret during the war, was apparently used at the base and stored in a special concrete building.
The bodies of 20 airmen, all assigned to a parent base in Sioux City, were brought to Mitchell after their bombers crashed on the South Dakota prairie.
And the stories go on.
Beginnings
Prior to World War II, there was a grass-strip runway at the site. Evelyn Walters, who grew up about one mile northeast of the airport, related her fond memories of the early days of aviation there.
"We'd go down there for the Fourth of July," Walters, of Letcher, told The Daily Republic last year, "and they would have some of the air acrobats walking out on the wings, and we would watch the planes do twirls."
In July 1941, with the United States still a bystander to the war, the federal government designated the facility a "defense airport" - not a full-fledged air base, but one of a national network of civilian airports that could support mass military flights in defense of the country. The designation came with the promise of federal funds to improve the airport, provided the city agreed to pay for a portion of the improvements.
When the Japanese brought the United States into the war with the Dec. 17 attack on Pearl Harbor, national and local leaders suddenly viewed the airport improvements with more urgency.
In the weeks following the Pearl Harbor attack, the Mitchell City Council sought voter approval to issue $60,000 in bonds to improve the airport. The bonds were viewed as necessary to secure $125,000 of additional funding from the federal government.
On Dec. 22, 1941, the bond issue passed with approval from 87 percent of local voters. Work was scheduled to begin in the spring of 1942, but by that time, the acceleration of the war had sparked new rumors about the federal government's plan for the airport.
Politics
The first hints that a full-fledged military air base would be constructed in Mitchell began appearing in The Daily Republic during the winter of 1941-1942. The government awarded large bases during that time to Sioux City and Rapid City, and the awarding of auxiliary bases was expected to follow.
During the late summer of 1942, an auxiliary base was awarded to Watertown.
A story about the Watertown base in The Daily Republic included a thinly veiled assurance for Mitchell residents from U.S. Rep. Karl Mundt, R-S.D.
"I expect that before the end of the week there will be a similar announcement regarding another South Dakota city," Mundt said.
It took a little longer than a week, but on Aug. 5, 1942, The Daily Republic announced that an Army Air Force base would be built in Mitchell.
Mitchell leased its 298 airport acres to the federal government and offered the government free use of the armory, the Corn Palace and the city's athletic fields. The federal government obtained an easement on an additional eight acres for the base, and another 1,082 acres were obtained from farmers who were forced to sell their land. Eventually, the government also leased 652 acres just north of the base to use as a rifle range.
Construction began on the base so quickly that some affected farmers had to cut down their crops before the harvest. Bob Smith, of Mitchell, grew up near the airport and remembered feeding some of his neighbors' corn to his family's farm animals.
Smith, who was interviewed by The Daily Republic last year, said the affected farmers had conflicting feelings.
"They didn't want to be obstructionists, but they really would rather not have had to sell it," Smith said. "As it was, they didn't have much choice."
'Small city'
After the land was secured, construction workers began pouring into Mitchell to build the base. An Aug. 21, 1942, news story proclaimed that "1,000 more workers" would be coming to the city in two weeks, adding to the unknown number of workers who were already in town.
Living quarters for the construction crews were in high demand. The Chamber of Commerce started a list of rooms for rent and professed its disappointment after "only" 330 rooms were registered during the first few weeks. Some of the workers and their families were forced to take up residence in a camp close to Hitchcock Park.
Construction moved forward at a furious pace. In the beginning, 100 trucks operated 24 hours a day to bring in materials and supplies.
By Sept. 5, 1942 - just one month after the air base announcement appeared in the paper - local reporter Maxine Herzog wrote with great enthusiasm about the incredibly fast pace of construction work. The story was titled "Small City Springs Up At Mitchell's Army Airbase."
"For out north aways," Herzog wrote, "just the other side of the lake and not so far from Loomis, is a 1,400-acre stretch of table land that is dusty with the roar of mechanical giants and seething with excitement. The air is filled with the tapping of hammers and the crunch of concrete mixers. It is Mitchell's satellite airbase under construction by the government."
Buildings were erected in a grove of trees that still stands at the airport.
Only a few trees were chopped down, U.S. Army Capt. Harry Curtis told Herzog, because "it would be a shame to unnecessarily remove any trees in this part of the country."
Herzog described the entire layout of the airbase, ending by telling her readers "believe me, it is colossal."
The base
On Oct. 10, 1942 - just two months after construction began - The Daily Republic reported that construction of the base was finished.
The paper published a descriptive story about the base with nine photos, but censorship apparently prohibited the paper from publishing anything about the mission of the base, the type of planes that would be there or the number of soldiers who would occupy it.
Not even the exact cost to build the base was reported. The government said the major contract for the base's construction was "between $1 million and
$5 million."
Further snippets of information about the base were eventually published.
Soldiers there were part of the Army's Second Air Force, and the planes included B-17 and B-24 bombers.
Military blueprints still on file at the airport provide information about the base's buildings and staff.
The blueprints list 76 buildings, including five officers' quarters and 15 enlisted men's barracks.
Each of the officers' quarters housed four officers, according to an Oct.
10, 1942, story by The Daily Republic. Various people in Mitchell who are old enough to remember the base have estimated that each of the enlisted men's barracks housed between 30 and 70 soldiers.
The base, then, could probably have supported anywhere from 470 to 1,070 soldiers. It's unknown whether the base was ever staffed to those levels, because no definitive data is readily available. The Daily Republic sent a Freedom of Information Act request to the U.S. Army for this story, but the request went unanswered.
Other buildings on the base included an officers' mess hall and recreation wing, a post-exchange, an enlisted men's mess hall, engineering executive offices, an administration building, a control tower, repair shops, storage facilities, a crash house and fire station, a hangar, and a "super concrete"
water tower that drew water from the Lake Mitchell filtration plant.
There was also a jail, which The Daily Republic took especial pleasure in
describing:
"Last but not least on the post is a cozy little cabin in the cottonwoods which is exclusive," the newspaper reported. "A high fence around the lot is for the sole protection of its guests. Although no roses have been planted around its shining front door, there are nicely fitted bars on the windows.
The sign-post says 'guard house.'"
Another building of particular interest is the one listed on the blueprints as "bombsight storage." Hal Wagner, of Mitchell, who worked as a mechanic at the airport for 35 years after the military vacated the base, said last year that the building housed the infamous Norden bombsight.
The bombsight, named for its inventor, Carl Norden, was such a highly prized and guarded secret of the U.S. military that bombardiers were instructed to guard it with their lives. Air bases had special, secure buildings for the storage and maintenance of the devices.
Wagner said the bombsight storage building at Mitchell was a concrete structure near the hangar. His description matches that of other Norden storage buildings across the country, including some that have been preserved as tourist attractions. Wagner said the local Norden storage building was removed two or three decades ago.
Young lust
Community members, fearing the havoc that soldiers with too much time on their hands might wreak on the city, organized recreational facilities and activities for off-duty times. The Mitchell Soldier Center in the city's Armory featured games of all kinds, a snack bar with a "constantly filled"
cookie jar, a "quiet room" and library, and organized dances.
Girls and women 18 or older who wished to attend the dances were encouraged to register as hostesses. The hostesses were required to arrive and leave with chaperons, wear informal dress "but not slacks," and report any "discourtesy" to their chaperon.
Such efforts at controlling the interactions between soldiers and young women didn't always work.
Just weeks after the base opened, the base's morale officer, Lt. R.A. Marks, pleaded with parents to keep their young girls home at night. He said late-night patrols had spotted 20 to 25 teenage girls prowling the streets near the base.
Marks said nearly 200 "mash notes," or love letters, had been received by soldiers at the base in just the first month of operation. In some of the notes, young girls tried to arrange meetings with the soldiers.
"We have found cases where the young girls, driving presumably their parents' cars, have picked up soldiers and produced the liquor for a party,"
Lt. Marks told The Daily Republic.
Later, in March 1943, a local judge charged that "filthy, diseased prostitutes" had consorted with soldiers and civilians in at least one Mitchell night spot. The judge ordered the sheriff to conduct a 30-day cleanup of the city's night spots, and the sheriff's quick action averted the judge's threatened grand jury investigation.
Morale Officer Marks eventually reported that the problem of young women "chasing" men in uniform had improved; if it had not, he said, Mitchell may have earned the distinction of having a venereal disease problem which may have required the assistance of the U.S. Health Department.
What remains
In November 1943, the Army removed heavy bomber units from Mitchell and seven other bases in the north and northwest because of "bad flying weather during the winter." The Mitchell base remained partially active until 1945, but The Daily Republic was not able to ascertain whether the base was every fully operational after the 1943 pullout of heavy bomber units.
The base was turned over to the city in March 1947, after the end of the war. The city received not only the 298 acres it had leased to the federal government, but also the eight acres the government had obtained by easement and the 1,082 acres the government had obtained from private landowners. As a condition of the deed transfer, the city agreed to use the land for a public airport.
Today, according to Mike Scherschligt, the city's airport manager, the only remaining structures from the base are the water tower, the hangar and a mysterious earthen shed.
The hangar is still used, but the water tower has been converted to a light beacon. The mysterious shed is in the undeveloped northwest portion of the airport, surrounded by land that the city leases to farmers. All but the wooden face of the shed is covered by earth, and inside there are several wooden crates that seem about the right size to hold a bomb. Neither Scherschligt nor any other source interviewed for this story knew what purpose the shed served.
Scherschligt said part of the airport's apron consists of the original concrete poured by the federal government in the 1940s. The concrete runways constructed by the government have been covered with asphalt.
Other remnants of the base can be seen around town.
Todd Dikoff, owner of the Brig Steakhouse, said the original owner of his business started it in "the brig" jailhouse at the air base after the military moved out. The building was then moved to its current location on North Main in 1951 and subsequently added onto. Dikoff said he still uses an old jail door from the air base to lock up at night.
Other buildings from the air base also were moved to start businesses. Larry Fredericksen, owner of Chef Louie's and the former Chief Motel, said the motel consisted of old barracks. He believes the original Chef Louie's building, which burned down decades ago, may also have been an old barrack.
Additional pieces of air base history are buried in the ground at two bombing ranges.
Mitchell Precision Bombing Range No. 3 was located on 7,680 acres about eight miles east of Fort Thompson in Buffalo County. Mitchell Precision Bombing Range No. 4 was located on 2,560 acres near Crow Lake in Jerauld County. Whether there were bombing ranges numbered 1 and 2 is unknown.
One reason it's known that bombing ranges No. 3 and 4 existed is because they are slated for inspections in fiscal year 2009 by the federal government's Formerly Used Defense Sites (FUDS) cleanup program. Inspectors will look for ordnance and associated materials that could be contaminating the soil or ground water.
Both sites will be checked for contamination from 3-pound, black-powder spotting charges. Bombs used on the ranges were filled with 100 pounds of sand, and the spotting charges were placed in the tails of the bombs to mark the impact location. Scrap from the practice bombs has been found at both sites, and a government report says additional scrap could be buried as deep as 6 feet.
Additionally, the Buffalo County site will be checked for contamination from .50 caliber cartridges and tracer rounds that were fired into the ground during air-to-ground gunnery target practice. Silhouettes of Japanese Zeros were placed on the ground there and used as targets.
At both sites, there are some visual cues that provide a link to the past.
There are some craters from the impact of the bombs, and a 1991 FUDS assessment team found a concrete slab and the remains of two towers at the Jerauld County site. The slab was thought to be the floor of a generator building, and the towers were among three used to pinpoint bomb targets by a process known as triangulation.
Stories, true or otherwise
A fatal bomber crash occurred in the area of Jerauld County's Bombing Range No. 4 on Aug. 26, 1943. It was preceded just two-and-a-half months earlier by a fatal two-bomber collision and crash June 13, 1943, near Fedora in Miner County. The planes in both crashes originated from a base in Sioux City.
In the Miner County incident, the tail of one of the bombers was sheared off in the collision, causing the bomber to crash. Eleven airmen aboard the bomber were killed. At least 10 additional soldiers were in the other bomber, which conducted an emergency landing and skidded into a creek bank.
The Army said none of the surviving airmen suffered life-threatening injuries.
The bodies of all 20 airmen killed in the separate crashes were brought to Mitchell, and soldiers from the Mitchell base were called out to the accident scene.
The stories of the airmen's deaths were recorded in editions of The Daily Republic. Other stories about the base seem to exist only in the memories of the World War II generation - such as the story about Jimmy Stewart's landing in Mitchell.
Stewart was assigned to a bomber group in Sioux City in 1943, and some bombers from Sioux City used the airfield at Mitchell. But The Daily Republic was not able to find any confirmation of Stewart's presence in the city.
None of the sources interviewed for this story recalled hearing about Stewart's flight into Mitchell at the time it supposedly happened, but some said they have heard stories about it since then. Author Bob Karolevitz mentioned the story in his "An Historic Sampler of Davison County," but he did not cite any supporting evidence.
The Stewart story and other unrecorded air base tales, then, may be destined to stay forever concealed behind the overgrowth of history. Others will live on in newspaper archives. And others, like the bomb scrap still buried somewhere out there, are still waiting to be dug up.
One thing that's certain is the heavy influence that the federal government's investment in the base has had on Mitchell. Every fall, for example, hundreds of pheasant hunters land at the airport and disperse throughout the area to shoot birds and spend money.
"I think it would be very safe to say," Scherschligt said, "that the military brunted a great deal of effort and cost to get this airport in place where it is."
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