Majors Airport
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Majors Airport Majors Army Airfield |
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2008 USGS airphoto
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| Summary | |||||||||||
| Airport type | Public | ||||||||||
| Owner | City of Greenville | ||||||||||
| Serves | Greenville, Texas | ||||||||||
| Elevation AMSL | 535 ft / 163 m | ||||||||||
| Coordinates | 33°04′04″N 096°03′55″W / 33.06778°N 96.06528°WCoordinates: 33°04′04″N 096°03′55″W / 33.06778°N 96.06528°W | ||||||||||
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 KGVT
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| Statistics (2007) | |||||||||||
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Source: Federal Aviation Administration
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| Aircraft operations | 35,640 |
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| Based aircraft | 39 |
Majors Airport (IATA: GVT, ICAO: KGVT, FAA LID: GVT) is a city-owned airport five miles southeast of Greenville, in Hunt County, Texas.
Originally named Majors Field, it is home to L-3 Communications Mission Integration Division (MID), which performs aircraft modification.
Majors Airport, named for Lieutenant Truett Majors, the first Hunt County native to perish in World War II, began operations on June 26, 1942, as a training center for the United States Army Air Forces. Lt Majors was killed in the 1942 Battle of the Philippines in January 1942. Greenville was chosen as a site for the USAAF basic flight-training center due to the efforts of the influential politician Sam Rayburn, the base was dedicated and named on 5 January 1943.
Majors Army Airfield was assigned initially to the Gulf Coast Training Center (later Central Flying Command), the airport was at one point the home to approximately 5,000 pilots, support personnel, and civilian employees. Majors also was a major training base for Women Airforce Service Pilots (WASP)s. Flying training was performed with Fairchild PT-19s as the primary trainer. Also had several PT-17 Stearmans and a few P-40 Warhawks assigned.
In addition to training United States Army pilots, the airfield was the training site for Escuadrón 201 of the Mexican Air Force. The training center was reassigned to Second Air Force on 30 November 1944 as a group training center, primary for the assignment of replacement personnel to combat squadrons in Overseas theaters.
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