Installation Research Tips

Copyright © 2000, 2002, Scott D. Murdock

2 Jun 2002 - Minor editing.

19 Nov 2002 - Updated style and format.

4 Feb 2003 - Added link to a coordinate translation web site.

Here is some information to assist with the study of Army Air Forces and U.S. Air Force installations (my target audience is already familiar with the Air Force and its history).

Installations may be studied much like organizations or individuals—by noting the chronological events that occur during their service. So here is a look at terminology, designations and abbreviations, research documents, research sources, and miscellaneous tools.

While written from an Air Force perspective, much of this information will apply to the research of Army, Navy, or Marine Corps installations (especially airfields).

Terminology

Here is a selection of common terms used when studying installations. I’ve categorized them as Description, Event, and Identification terms for ease in studying them—this is not an official categorization.

These are working definitions, gathered from a variety of sources and tempered with several years' experience reconciling the official definitions with the usage actually found in orders and publications.

Description Terms

Event Terms

Identification Terms

Designations and Abbreviations

Here is a list, by no means complete, of designations used by the Air Force, and their abbreviations.

Research Documents

General and Special Orders

Key events in an installation’s history are announced by the publication of a special order or general order. The Department of the Air Force (DAF) or the respective Major Command (MAJCOM) may publish the order (sometimes both). These orders are important to an installation's history much like promotion or PCS orders are important to a military person's career—they are the "official" source of the action they describe.  Orders are not always perfect!  They are occasionally published with errors and may be revoked, rescinded, or amended by later orders.

Directories and Station Lists

The USAF Installations Directory is a point-in-time listing providing information on the service’s inventory of installations. Prior to 1948, Army Air Forces Installations Directories, Army Air Forces Station Lists, and Air Corps Station Lists filled this same function. These documents give the installation name, location, command assignment, status, and possibly other information. They may show relationships between primary bases and off-base or detached installations. They may give details such as latitude and longitude coordinates, acreage, or runway specifics. Depending on the time period represented, these may or may not provide coverage of smaller detached or off-base installations.

A similar set of documents is the Army & Navy Directory of Airfields, or it’s modern equivalent, the Flight Information Publications. These are meant for use by flyers, so they will concentrate on the operational details of the installations.  And of course, only flying installations will be found here.

Major Commands (MAJCOMs) and Numbered Air Forces (NAFs) have also produced various directories and lists over the years. Depth and breadth of coverage varies considerably.

Layout Plans and Vicinity Maps

These are to an installation like a floor plan is to a house.  They show boundaries, building layouts, runway lengths, and other physical features.  Sometimes you can find helpful chronological information by studying the legend and tables on the plans.

MAJCOM or Unit Histories

These focus more on the operations of the unit or command than on the real property from which the units lived and worked. You may need to sift through hundreds of pages to find any good installation data, but it may be well worth the effort. The official history may offer insight not available from an order or a directory (selection process for the location, problems encountered in its acquisition and development, activities at the installation, maps, etc.).

Government Databases

The DoD maintains a geographic locations database, which lists most active (and many inactive) installations.  Includes latitude/longitude coordinates, although in many cases they are grossly inaccurate.

The Federal Aviation Administration sometimes has airport databases available on its web site.  This data will include those USAF installations with airfields (or at least a published helipad).
 

Research Sources

Air Force Historical Research Agency (AFHRA)

This is the official repository of Air Force history.  They have quite a few Airfield Directories, Installation Directories, and related documents.  They also have tons (literally) of unit and command histories.

Air University Library (AUL)

This is one of the largest libraries, anywhere.  One of my favorite items is in the Authority Section.  They have a several-volume, bound-book set of DAF General and Special Orders from 1947 to the late 1970s.

Air Force Real Property Publications

To learn about current USAF doctrine and procedures for controlling real property, try Air Force Handbook (AFH) 32-9007, Managing Air Force Real Property.  For more specific information, try Air Force Instruction (AFI) 32-9001, Acquisition of Real Property; AFI 32-9004, Disposal of Real Property; and AFI 32-9005, Real Property Accountability and Reporting.  All are available online in the Air Force Master Catalog.   Search for Organization "AF," Subject Area "Civil Engineering," and Product Type "Publication."

United States Air Force Museum Research Division

More than just artifacts!  They have a wealth of research materials, including several Airfield Directories and similar documents.

MAJCOM and Wing History Offices

Some have more than others—due to focus on units versus bases.  You won't know what's there until you ask.  Be aware these offices are staffed to produce unit histories every six months; helping outside researchers is a secondary task.  They may allow you access to certain research materials but they won't (and shouldn't) do your research for you!

Air Force Base Libraries

You can find the occasional gem here.  In 1994, the Randolph AFB base library still had hard copies of Air Force magazine dating to the early 1950s.  The annual almanac issues have base listings that are quite handy -- plenty of Air Staff and MAJCOM action officers use these as a quick reference to AF bases around the world.

National Archives and Records Administration (NARA)

The official government document repositories.  The main repositories are in Washington DC and College Park, Maryland.  They also have regional facilities; for example the Fort Worth facility (Southwest Region) covers Texas, Oklahoma, Louisiana, and Arkansas.  The Southwest Region maintains a database of place names, which makes it easy to look up a former military base by name or nearest city (I'm not sure if other regions offer this service).  NARA maintains archives categorized in Record Groups, and here are some I have found useful:

The GSA disposal case files in RG 269 are especially useful.  They typically include layout plans, real estate maps, brief histories of the property, and sometimes nice "for sale" flyers that describe exactly what the property consists of (including details like buildings, fuel tanks, generators, etc.).

U.S. Army Corps of Engineers

This is the military's real estate agent!  They also manage the Defense Environmental Restoration Program-Formerly Used Defense Sites (DERP-FUDS) program.  Plenty of information is on the web at the DERP-FUDS site, free for the viewing.

Radomes, Inc. Online Radar Museum

Gene McManus and Tom Page lead Radomes, Inc. and the Online Radar Museum.  Their primary mission and current focus is to document Air Control and Warning (later called simply Radar) Squadrons which were in the United States, both the "lower 48" and Alaska.  They are also documenting certain overseas sites that were front-line Early Warning sites, located in Greenland and Iceland.  This is THE place to look for information on radar sites.

Ed Thelen's Nike Missile Web Site

This should be your first stop if you are looking for information on a Nike site.  Building on the published work of pioneer researcher Mark Morgan, Ed has gathered information on location and current status of Nike sites from a wide network of contributors (inluding yours truly as one of the "TerraServants".)

Miscellaneous Tools

Much of my research involves finding the locations of installations.  A basic understanding of latitude and longitude is very helpful; if you can find these coordinates in a document, you can then point to the location on a map, find it in mapping software, or find your way to the place with a Global Positioning System (GPS) receiver.

Coordinates and Surveys

Many geographic coordinate systems exist, the most common being latitude (north/south) and longitude (east/west).  One obstacle here is the method of displaying the information; degrees-minutes-seconds (DD-MM-SS), or degrees-decimal minutes (DD-MM.MM).  Once in a while you'll encounter decimal degrees (DD.DDDD), just to keep it interesting!  I have built a quick-reference conversion chart (#1) for converting DD-MM-SS to DD-MM.MM and vice versa.  Also, based on increased popularity of the decimal degrees format among some users, I built a conversion chart (#2) for converting DD-MM-SS to DD.DDDD and vice versa.  At locations near the equator, a degree is about 60 miles, a minute is about one mile, and a second is about 88 feet.  This makes a handy rule of thumb when you're working with coordinates and maps.  Here is a web site that will perform coordinate translation. 

A college text on surveying may be helpful if you're just learning to use coordinate systems.  A common mistake of beginners is to think that 33-20-10 means the same thing as 33-20.10.  There's a big difference between 10 seconds and .10 of a minute.  If you're puzzled by this, please find a textbook and study up before you try to work with latitude and longitude.

Survey descriptions are also useful in determining locations from layout plans, deeds, leases, and other real property documents.  A surveying textbook will give an explanation of surveying terms and how to use them.

Maps and Charts

Among the best for installation research are the United States Geological Survey (USGS) topographical maps in scale 1:24,000.  This gives you a map covering about 7.5 x 7.5 miles, detailed enough to show individual buildings.  Many military installations will be clearly marked; sometimes by name or sometimes just by the title "MILITARY RESERVATION."  The 1:24,000 and 1:100,000 maps also show survey descriptions (township/range/section information) if applicable in that locality.  Even smaller scale, 1:250,000 scale maps also list some military installations and other features of interest (radar towers, etc.).

The various types of aeronautical charts are useful for pinpointing an airfield if you know approximately where it is (or was). You may also locate bombing ranges by the Restricted Areas marking the airspace over the range.  Some navigation aids (radio range, radio beacon, VOR, etc.) will show on the charts, allowing you to locate some small off-base installations. Certain data about the airfield (runways, tower, radio, etc.) may be deciphered from the symbols on the chart, and from notes on the margins or reverse.

Mapping Software

A mapping program is helpful for searching out military sites, and for marking their locations once you find them.  Street Atlas 6.0 is my favorite, but I also use Precision Mapping (PM) 3.0.  SA 6.0 has nicer looking maps and is convenient for planning field trips; but has no provision to measure the straight-line distance between points, and switching the display from DD-MM-SS to DD-MM.MM requires editing a system.ini file.   PM 3.0 has less aesthetic map displays; but switching coordinate types is easy, as is measuring straight-line distance between two points.

Microsoft's TerraServer

The Internet is home to a fantastic free resource, United States Geologic Survey aerial photographs via Microsoft's TerraServer web site.  It is very handy for verifying the location of an installation, especially one with distinctive features like a missile or radar site.  And once you find a photo of interest, one more mouse click will show you a latitude/longitude grid superimposed on the photo!  They have also added USGS topographic maps at varying scales, so you can switch from photos to maps.  One trick if you are searching for something in particular, is to use all the available maps.   The 2m and 4m views use the 1:24,000 scale maps; the 8m and 16m views use the 1:100,000 scale maps, and the 32m and higher views use the 1:250,000 scale maps.   Different maps of the same area may be many years apart in age, so one might show you an important detail not found on the others.  Take your time and look at them all.

Tom Page offers this tip when you are interpreting aerial photographs.  Some of the USGS photos are shot at a slight angle.  On some photos this looks quite natural, and helps distinguish objects on the ground.  Sometimes, however, it looks quite odd -- as if you were looking down between your feet and behind you at the ground.  In these cases, try downloading the image and flip it over (invert it) with your image reading software before you analyze it -- this might make the detail in the photo look more normal, and easier to decipher.

Global Positioning System (GPS) Receiver

If your research includes frequent field trips to old bases, you'll want one of these.  I use a Magellan GPS 2000 (1995 vintage), and a Garmin GPSIII (1999 vintage).  The Magellan tracks slower, but allows a choice of coordinate types, and has a larger numerical display -- easy to read when you're trying to stay out of the big ruts on an old dirt road.  The Garmin is more accurate, tracks quicker and has a moving map display, but the small font on the display is difficult to read (at least, it is to this Forty-Something with bifocals).

The margin of navigation error with GPS is about 10 meters or less, now that the USAF has stopped intentionally degrading the signal for us civilian users.  If you're trying to pinpoint a car in a parking lot, that's still a lot of error.  If you're differentiating a Nike control site from the launcher site, it's not much error at all.  I look at it this way; if I'm marking my position on a map based on a GPS readout, the technical error is probably less than my transcription error when I draw an "X" with a stubby pencil!

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