Majors Airport

Majors Airport Majors Army Airfield
2008 USGS airphoto
IATA: GVT – ICAO: KGVT – FAA LID: GVT
Summary
Airport type		Public
Owner		City of Greenville
Serves		Greenville, Texas
Elevation AMSL		535 ft / 163 m
Coordinates		33°04′04″N 096°03′55″W
Map
KGVT Location of Majors Airport
Runways
Direction	Length		Surface
	ft	m
17/35	8,030	2,448	Asphalt
Statistics (2007)
Aircraft operations			35,640
Based aircraft			39
Source: Federal Aviation Administration

Majors Airport (IATA: GVT, ICAO: KGVT, FAA Location identifier: GVT) is a city-owned, public-use airport located four nautical miles (7 km) southeast of the central business district of Greenville, a city in Hunt County, Texas, United States.

Originally named Majors Field, is mostly used for general aviation, but is also home to an L-3 Communications facility that is used to modify aircraft.

History

Majors Airport, named for Lieutenant Truett Majors, the first Hunt County native to perish in World War II, began operations on June 26, 1942, as a training center for the United States Army Air Forces. Lt Majors was killed in the 1942 Battle of the Philippines in January 1942. Greenville was chosen as a site for the USAAF basic flight-training center due to the efforts of the influential politician Sam Rayburn, the base was formally dedicated and named on 5 January 1943.

Majors Army Airfield was assigned initially to the Gulf Coast Training Center (later Central Flying Command), the airport was at one point the home to approximately 5,000 pilots, support personnel, and civilian employees. Majors also was a major training base for Women Airforce Service Pilots (WASP)s. Flying training was performed with Fairchild PT-19s as the primary trainer. Also had several PT-17 Stearmans and a few P-40 Warhawks assigned.

In addition to training United States Army pilots, the airfield was the training site for Escuadrón 201 of the Mexican Air Force. The training center was reassigned to Second Air Force on 30 November 1944 as a group training center, primary for the assignment of replacement personnel to combat squadrons in Overseas theaters.

Majors AAF was inactivated on 18 July 1945 after the defeat of Germany; the city of Greenville then took ownership of the property, then leased the site to TEMCO (later L-3 Communications).

Facilities and aircraft

Majors Airport covers an area of 1,525 acres (617 ha) at an elevation of 535 feet (163 m) above mean sea level. It has one runway designated 17/35 with an asphalt surface measuring 8,030 by 150 feet (2,448 x 46 m).

For the 12-month period ending April 30, 2007, the airport had 35,640 aircraft operations, an average of 97 per day: 92% general aviation and 8% military. At that time there were 39 aircraft based at this airport: 90% single-engine and 10% multi-engine.

See also

• Texas World War II Army Airfields

Other sources

•  This article incorporates public domain material from the Air Force Historical Research Agency website http://www.afhra.af.mil/.
• Shaw, Frederick J. (2004), Locating Air Force Base Sites History's Legacy, Air Force History and Museums Program, United States Air Force, Washington DC, 2004.
• Manning, Thomas A. (2005), History of Air Education and Training Command, 1942–2002. Office of History and Research, Headquarters, AETC, Randolph AFB, Texas ASIN: B000NYX3PC
• Thole, Lou (1999), Forgotten Fields of America : World War II Bases and Training, Then and Now - Vol. 2. Publisher: Pictorial Histories Pub, ISBN 1-57510-051-7

External links

• Majors Airport Homepage
• FAA Terminal Procedures for GVT, effective November 28, 2024
• Resources for this airport:
  • FAA airport information for GVT
  • AirNav airport information for KGVT
  • ASN accident history for GVT
  • FlightAware airport information and live flight tracker
  • NOAA/NWS latest weather observations
  • SkyVector aeronautical chart, Terminal Procedures