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1940 - 1949
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1941 - the Civil Aeronautics Authority provided the money for the development of the Great Falls Municipal Airport.
1942, May - Construction began on an Army Air corps base six miles east of Great Falls. The base was known as East Base.
1942, Jul 6 - Great Falls Army Air Base was assigned to 2nd Air force with Maj. John L. Eaton as its first commander.
1942 to 1943 - The 385th and 390th Bombardment Groups, trained at Great Falls. They later went on to participate in decisive raids over Germany that opened the door for Allied daylight precision bombing.
1943 - The Great Falls AAB saw the establishment of Station 5, Alaskan Wing, Air Transport Command, and a change of command from 2nd AF to the Air Service Command.
1943 - More buildings were constructed at the East Base, including a consolidated mess, a post exchange, a theater and a 400-bed hospital. The Air Service command then moved its units from Gore Field (the Municipal Airport) to the base.
1944, Jan 1 - Great Falls Army Air Base was reassigned to the Air Transport command to continue its mission of ferrying lend-lease aircraft to the Soviet Union.
1944 - Col. Anatol N. Kotikov, Soviet Union representative at Great Falls AAB, supervised the departure of 3,204 aircraft to Russia. The aircraft included P-39's, C-47's, B-25's, and A-20's.
1945, Feb 1st - Col Einar Malmstrom is assigned to Great Falls Air Force Base where he served as Deputy Wing Commander.
1947, Sep - The U.S. Air Force becomes a separate military service and a number of major mission changes occurred at the Great Falls Air Force Base.
1948 - Operation Vittles was born. Vittles was the strategic airlift of supplies to a city of over 2,000,000 inhabitants of Berlin after the Soviet Union blockaded that city. Great Falls AFB was selected to be the site where the pilots and crews of Operation Vittles did their training.
1949 - Each tourist was estimated to have spent $17.00 per 24-hour stay in the Great Falls area. So said Chamber of Commerce president, Lou Siniff, in 1949.
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Credits:
Great Falls - A Pictorial History
by William J. Furdell
and Elizabeth Lane Furdell

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