Eberts Field

Eberts Field
Lonoke, Arkansas
Eberts Field Arkansas Station Area, c. 1918
Eberts Field
Coordinates	34°47′43″N 091°55′09″W / 34.79528°N 91.91917°W / 34.79528; -91.91917 (Eberts Field)Coordinates: 34°47′43″N 091°55′09″W / 34.79528°N 91.91917°W / 34.79528; -91.91917 (Eberts Field)
Type	Army Airfield
Site information
Controlled by	Air Service, United States Army   United States Army Air Forces
Condition	Aquaculture, rural housing, farming
Site history
Built	1917
In use	1917-1945
Battles/wars	World War I World War II
Garrison information
Garrison	Training Section, Air Service (World War I) Army Air Force Training Command (World War I)

Eberts Field is a former military airfield, located 1.4 miles (2.3 km) northwest of Lonoke, Arkansas. The airfield was one of thirty-two Air Service training camps established in 1917 after the United States entry into World War I.

It operated as a training field during World War I for the Air Service, United States Army between 1917 until 1919. The airfield was also used as a contract glider training airfield during World War II by the United States Army Air Forces, being closed in 1943.

Today the land is used in aquaculture.

Eberts Field was named for Signal Corps Captain Melchior Eberts, a native Arkansan and a West Point Graduate. On 11 August 1916, he was attached to the Aviation Section of the Signal Corps and on 3 March 1917 received the rating of junior military aviation. He was ordered from his station at Rockwell Field, San Diego, California to Columbus Airfield, New Mexico on 3 May 1917. Lieutenant Eberts was killed while making an airplane exhibition flight.

In January 1918, the Department of War sent a cadre of officers to the Lonoke, Arkansas area to survey sites for an aviation school. The group decided on a location northwest of Lonoke, and an agreement to lease the land for the Army was concluded, and the construction of some 50 buildings began. It covered ovrer 700 acres. Dozens of wooden buildings served as headquarters, maintenance, and officers’ quarters. Enlisted men had to bivouac in tents. Built as a flying training airfield, the airfield consisted of a row of about a dozen hangars, arranged north-south on the east side of the airfield. Landings and takeoffs were on an all-direction turf field, measuring about 5,200' x 2,460'.

Eberts Field opened in March 1918 as a World War I basic aviators school, approximately 2,500 enlisted men and officers were stationed there between 1918 and 1919. In 1918, flight training occurred in two phases: primary and advanced. Primary training took eight weeks and consisted of pilots learning basic flight skills under dual and solo instruction with a student capacity of 300. After completion of their primary training at Mather, flight cadets were then transferred to another base for advanced training.