Grenier Air Force Base
Grenier Air Force Base
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| Part of Continental Air Command (ConAC) | |
| Manchester-Boston Regional Airport, New Hampshire | |
Manchester Airport, circa 1998
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 Grenier AFB
Location of Grenier Air Force Base, New Hampshire
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| Coordinates | 42°55′57″N 71°26′08″W / 42.93250°N 71.43556°WCoordinates: 42°55′57″N 71°26′08″W / 42.93250°N 71.43556°W |
| Type | Air Force Base |
| Site history | |
| Built | 1927 |
| In use | 1940-1966 |
| Garrison information | |
| Garrison |
 732d Troop Carrier Squadron (1957-1966) |
| Airfield information | |||||||||||||||
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| Summary | |||||||||||||||
| Elevation AMSL | 266 ft / 81 m | ||||||||||||||
| Runways | |||||||||||||||
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Grenier Air Force Base is a former United States Air Force base located three miles (5 km) south of the central business district of Manchester, New Hampshire, on the county line of Hillsborough and Rockingham counties. After its closure in 1966, it was reopened as Manchester-Boston Regional Airport.
The Manchester airport was founded in June 1927, when the city's Board of Mayor and Aldermen put $15,000 towards the project. By October, a board of aviation had been founded and ground was broken at an 84-acre (340,000 m2) site near Pine Island Pond. It took only a month for two 1,800-foot (550 m) runways to be constructed. After the formation of Northeast Airways at the site in 1933, the first passenger terminal was built.
New Boston Air Force Station was established in 1940 at Manchester Airport in the build-up of the United States Army Air Corps prior to World War II. Grenier AAF's initial mission after the Pearl Harbor Attack was to support the squadrons of the First Air Force I Bomber Command and later Army Air Forces Antisubmarine Command with a mission to patrol the Atlantic coast, locate and attack German U-boats. During the war, bombers and fighters practiced over the area now known as New Boston Air Force Station 12 miles (19 km) west in the town of New Boston.
On February 22, 1942, the base was dedicated as Grenier Army Airfield to honor 2nd Lt Jean Donat Grenier, born in Manchester on November 24, 1909, and killed on February 16, 1934, in the crash of Curtiss A-12 Shrike 33-244 in bad weather at Oakley, Utah, while flying an advance air mail route between Salt Lake City and Cheyenne, Wyoming.
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