Hobbs Army Air Field:

Incalculable Impact on Community

            Riding my bicycle for some much needed exercise last week around Harry McAdams Park and around Rock Winds Community Links, I stopped peddling and dismounted to take a drink of water.

            It just happened that when I was thirsty and stopped in front of the sign that announces the area was once the Hobbs Army Air Field.  That was almost one hundred years ago, almost a century, since the runways and hangers were built to supply the US Army with airplane pilots, crews, and mechanics to destroy the armies and air forces of Germany, Italy, and Japan.

            The HAAF had an impact on the U.S. achieving that goal.  And the airfield also had a tremendous impact on southeastern New Mexico, Lea County, and the communities in the county.

            That impact continues to express itself in so many ways they are almost incalculable, especially if you try to imagine what the area will look like in another century.

            The basic facts about the HAAF are known by most longtime residents of Lea.  In 1941, Japan attacked Pearl Harbor.  In 1942 Hobbs was selected as a site for one of the many Army bases to supply bomber pilots and crews.  The first deployment of the Women’s Auxiliary Air Corps arrives.  In 1944, the final buildings were completed at the field.  In 1945, Germany and Japan surrendered.  In 1946 the HAAF started ferrying the remaining aircraft to National Guard bases.

            However, the detailed life on the base for those working there is not as well known.  The photographs appearing with this History Notebook column shed some light on what life was like for the men, women, and children who lived there.

            These photos were donated to the Lea County Museum in Lovington by a woman who was a WAC and was working in the Army’s photography lab.  Her name was Mildred Schutz, and she donated dozens of images just a couple of years before she died in Florida where she had lived.

            The fascinating historic images are on file at the Lea County Museum.  They say much about life at the airfield and about life in the county at the time.

            They do not speak to the changes in Lea County residents following the war because of the presence of the base for just a brief few years.

            The impact of HAAF was both very general and incredibly specific for the region.  It changed the working lives of many local residents who lived in Lea.  It brought thousands of individuals to Hobbs and Lovington who would never have even been aware that such towns existed.  It poured millions of dollars into the local economy.  It created a military cultural awareness that the county would not have had.  It was a huge factor in the number of commercial and private pilots who took up careers and hobbies in the air.

            Hundreds of individuals still alive today can relate how they are impacted by family members or neighbors who continue to be influenced directly and indirectly by the airbase having been located north of Hobbs, just off the Lovington Highway.

            Finally, the presence of the HAAF can be seen today in a golf course, a national soaring club office, an attractive city park and camping site, a prison, a state police headquarters, the City of Hobbs driver’s license building, gun ranges, and much more in what is called the Hobbs Industrial Park.

            Who knows what might be on the former airfield site in years to come?