Jones Field
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Jones Field is a city-owned, public-use
airport An airport is an aerodrome with extended facilities, mostly for commercial Aviation, air transport. They usually consist of a landing area, which comprises an aerially accessible open space including at least one operationally active surf ...
located two 
nautical mile A nautical mile is a unit of length used in air, marine, and space navigation, and for the definition of territorial waters. Historically, it was defined as the meridian arc length corresponding to one minute ( of a degree) of latitude at t ...
s (4  km) north of the
central business district A central business district (CBD) is the Commerce, commercial and business center of a city. It contains commercial space and offices, and in larger cities will often be described as a financial district. Geographically, it often coincides wit ...
of Bonham, a city in
Fannin County, Texas Fannin County is a county in the far northeast of the U.S. state of Texas, on the border with Oklahoma. As of the 2020 census, its population was 35,662, making it the 87th-most populous county in Texas. The entirety of Fannin County is a part ...
, United States. It is included in the
National Plan of Integrated Airport Systems The National Plan of Integrated Airport Systems (NPIAS) is an inventory of U.S. aviation infrastructure assets. With the Airport and Airway Improvement Act of September 3, 1982, the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) was required to develop a ...
for 2011–2015, which categorized it as a ''
general aviation General aviation (GA) is defined by the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) as all civil aviation aircraft operations except for commercial air transport or aerial work, which is defined as specialized aviation services for other ...
'' airport.


Facilities and aircraft

Jones Field covers an area of 300
acre The acre ( ) is a Unit of measurement, unit of land area used in the Imperial units, British imperial and the United States customary units#Area, United States customary systems. It is traditionally defined as the area of one Chain (unit), ch ...
s (121 ha) at an
elevation The elevation of a geographic location (geography), ''location'' is its height above or below a fixed reference point, most commonly a reference geoid, a mathematical model of the Earth's sea level as an equipotential gravitational equipotenti ...
of 618 feet (188 m) above
mean sea level A mean is a quantity representing the "center" of a collection of numbers and is intermediate to the extreme values of the set of numbers. There are several kinds of means (or "measures of central tendency") in mathematics, especially in statist ...
. It has one
runway In aviation, a runway is an elongated, rectangular surface designed for the landing and takeoff of an aircraft. Runways may be a human-made surface (often asphalt concrete, asphalt, concrete, or a mixture of both) or a natural surface (sod, ...
designated 17/35 with an
asphalt Asphalt most often refers to: * Bitumen, also known as "liquid asphalt cement" or simply "asphalt", a viscous form of petroleum mainly used as a binder in asphalt concrete * Asphalt concrete, a mixture of bitumen with coarse and fine aggregates, u ...
surface measuring 4,000 by 75 feet (1,219 x 23 m). For the 12-month period ending September 16, 2022, the airport had 13,600
general aviation General aviation (GA) is defined by the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) as all civil aviation aircraft operations except for commercial air transport or aerial work, which is defined as specialized aviation services for other ...
aircraft operations, an average of 37 per day. At that time there were 24 aircraft based at this airport: 23 single-
engine An engine or motor is a machine designed to convert one or more forms of energy into mechanical energy. Available energy sources include potential energy (e.g. energy of the Earth's gravitational field as exploited in hydroelectric power ge ...
, and 1 helicopter.


History

Originally dedicated as the Bonham city airport on November 11, 1929 as George Jones Airport. The land was leased from the city of Bonham, and construction began in summer 1941. The school opened on October 4, 1941, and had three hangars and a 1200’ x 100’ asphalt ramp among its facilities. Activated by the
United States Army Air Forces The United States Army Air Forces (USAAF or AAF) was the major land-based aerial warfare service component of the United States Army and ''de facto'' aerial warfare service branch of the United States during and immediately after World War II ...
on October 4, 1941. Assigned to the USAAF Gulf Coast Training Center (later Central Flying Training Command) as a primary (level 1) pilot training airfield. Base unit was 2547th Army Air Force Base Unit (Contract Pilot School, Primary). Pilot school operated by Bonham Aviation School under control of 302d Army Air Forces Flying Training Detachment. This was a civil contract flying school, providing elementary flying training for the Army Air Forces. At some point in time, probably in 1942, the property was purchased by the Defense Plant Corporation (who referred to it as PLANCOR 435) and leased back to Bonham Aviation School. This was a typical arrangement for contract flying schools serving the Army Air Forces. Flying training was performed with
Fairchild PT-19 The Fairchild PT-19 (company designation Fairchild M62) is an American monoplane primary trainer aircraft that served with the United States Army Air Forces, Royal Air Force, RAF and Royal Canadian Air Force, RCAF during World War II. Design ...
s as the primary trainer. Also had several
PT-17 Stearman The Stearman (Boeing) Model 75 is an American biplane formerly used as a military Trainer (aircraft), trainer aircraft, of which at least 10,626 were built in the United States during the 1930s and 1940s. Stearman Aircraft became a subsidiary o ...
s and a few
P-40 Warhawk The Curtiss P-40 Warhawk is an American single-engined, single-seat, all-metal fighter-bomber that first flew in 1938. The P-40 design was a modification of the previous Curtiss P-36 Hawk which reduced development time and enabled a rapid entry ...
s assigned. The last student flew on 12 October 1944, and the school was inactivated on 16 October 1944 with the drawdown of AAFTC's pilot training program and was declared surplus and turned over to the Army Corps of Engineers. Eventually discharged to the War Assets Administration (WAA) returned to civil control.


See also

* Texas World War II Army Airfields *
List of airports in Texas This list of airports in Texas (a U.S. state) is grouped by type and sorted by location. It contains all public-use and military airports in the state. Some private-use and former airports may be included where notable, such as airports that wer ...
*
31st Flying Training Wing (World War II) The 31st Flying Training Wing was a Flight training, training formation of the United States Army Air Forces, U.S. Army Air Forces (AAF) during World War II. The wing's mission was to train personnel of the Army Air Forces Training Command, U ...


References

* * Manning, Thomas A. (2005), ''History of Air Education and Training Command, 1942–2002''. Office of History and Research, Headquarters, AETC, Randolph AFB, Texas * Shaw, Frederick J. (2004), ''Locating Air Force Base Sites, History’s Legacy'', Air Force History and Museums Program, United States Air Force, Washington DC.


External links


Aerial image as of January 1996
from
USGS The United States Geological Survey (USGS), founded as the Geological Survey, is an government agency, agency of the United States Department of the Interior, U.S. Department of the Interior whose work spans the disciplines of biology, geograp ...
''
The National Map ''The National Map'' is a Collaboration, collaborative effort of the United States Geological Survey (USGS) and other federal, state, and local agencies to improve and deliver topographic information for the United States. The purpose of the eff ...
'' * * {{Portal bar, Aviation, Texas Airports in Texas Buildings and structures in Fannin County, Texas Transportation in Fannin County, Texas Airfields of the United States Army Air Forces in Texas USAAF Contract Flying School Airfields 1938 establishments in Texas USAAF Central Flying Training Command American Theater of World War II