Bryan Air Force Base
The end of World War II saw the Bryan Army Air Field declared inactive and the site was repurposed as an extension, or "Annex," to Texas A&M. About that same time, the U.S. Army Air Forces was split into a separate branch of service and renamed the United States Air Force. Thus, with the onset of the Korean War and the July 1951 reactivation of the military base in Brazos County, the installation became known as Bryan Air Force Base.
In the few short years between World War II and the Korean war, aviation technology advanced dramatically. Jet aircraft became the principle instrument of aerial warfare. To accommodate the new planes, more than $6 million was invested into Bryan Air Force Base, which included the expansion of its main runways from 5,000 to 7,000 feet.
At the height of the Korean War, more than 4,000 people were assigned to Bryan Air Force Base. Americans as well as pilots from several foreign countries were trained there. By 1955, roughly two years after the end of hostilities in Asia, the number of base personnel began to decline and by 1957, when the Air Force announced it had no plans to use the base after July 1, 1958, Bryan Air Force Base employed fewer than 600 people.
Click on a link below to learn more about this period of RELLIS Campus history.
