Page 5 - Aerotech News and Review, March 4, 2022

Compton/Woodley Airport’s ‘hidden history’

by Larry Grooms cer was confused and perplexed. The schools at Compton trained more than With support from pilot groups, local and higher capacity turboprop and light
special to Aerotech News base commander set the man straight, 500 Black civilian pilots in the 1950s. citizens and the Mayor and Compton jet aircraft. Among other features, the
and Jim Woods was taught to fly at The number exceeded any other loca- City Council, the Board of Supervi- airport has dual parallel runways (each
COMPTON, Calif. — In its final Randolph and shipped off to Tuskegee tion. sors voted to claim the facility as a re- 3,322’ by 60’) with the south runway
meeting in the last week of February’s in Alabama where be became a flight In addition to closing the missing gional airport. In June 1966, the County equipped with a precision approach
Black History Month, a Los Angeles instructor for the Red Tails. link in Black history for Compton/ bought the nearly 77-acre site outright. path indicator (PAPI), full- and self-ser-
County Aviation Commissioner re- The “official” Compton Airport Woodley Airport, Simmons updated Through the financial cooperation of vice fueling services (100LL) available
vealed the long, nearly-forgotten his- website history begins with the tale the community airport’s more mod- the Federal Aviation Administration
tory of Compton/Woodley Airport’s of a military pilot who found himself ern legacy in a series of events from and the State Division of Aeronautics, around the clock, and advanced weather
pioneering work to put the first Black running out of fuel and daylight on a the early 1990s. He screened and nar- the entire property was acquired for reporting equipment such as the recent-
Americans in the pilot’s seat, by inte- June Gloom afternoon in 1924. Col. C. rated videos of the reconstruction of $2,948,883, including 53.64 percent ly installed state-of-the-art Automated
grating its flight school. Some of its S. Smith landed on an empty field in a crash-damaged Jet Commander that federal aid. Weather Observing System (AWOS).
licensed black pilots would later form, Compton. He liked the site for airport was trucked-from Van Nuys Airport to The most recently
fly and fight as World War II’s famed and bought the land from a school dis- Compton, restored to Federal Aviation available statistics from
Tuskegee Airmen. trict. Administration airworthiness certifi- the Aviation Division of
Commissioner Clinton Simmons, Thus began a string of changes in cation, flown out Sept. 7, 1991, for a the Los Angeles County
age 85 and first appointed by former ownership, culminating in 1936 with 2-hour shakedown including a landing Department of Public
Supervisor Yvonne Burke in 1993, is airport expansion under Earl Woodley. to pick up passengers at another airport Works report Comp-
the longest serving airports commis- The previous information gap on Afri- before returning to Compton/Woodley. ton/Woodley generates
sioner in L.A. County’s 2nd District, can American flight training at Comp- Simmons said Chet Duncan was the pi- more than 60,000 gen-
now represented by Supervisor and ton falls between 1936, when private lot in command of the Black crew. eral aviation takeoffs and
Board Chair Holly J. Mitchell, in whose flight schools like Compton ramped up With degrees in electronics and man- landings each year. The
district Compton/Woodley Airport is to train civilian pilots, and the U.S. en- agement science, and a career path that airport is publicly avail-
located. try into World War II in 1941. led through private contracting, con- able to general aviation
Simmons told the ZOOM meeting During the war years of 1941-1946, sulting, subcontracting with Douglas aircraft 24-hours a day
audience, “Compton Airport was the private flying was restricted, and the Aircraft, and finally retirement after seven days a week and
first airport west of the Mississippi to airport was used exclusively by the 20 years with JPL, Simmons kept his is home to 200 based air-
integrate its flight school.” military as an aviation depot. After hands and heart active at Compton/ craft and aviation-related
Simmons explained that a Black the hostilities ceased, private flying Woodley, serving as a flight instructor businesses and organiza-
student at USC was the first to earn a re-emerged at Compton under Wood- and advocating for the airport. tions.
pilots’ license at Compton, which quali- ley. He hired instructors and bought According to the county website, Compton/Woodley
fied him to enlist in the U.S. Army Air airplanes, and with the profits from his upon Woodley’s death in 1962, the Airport accommodates
Corps for military flight school. Re- flying school enterprise, purchased the property was acquired by an investment both fixed and rotary-
calling the experience of early Comp- additional land parcels that are included company, leading the county’s Aviation wing aircraft ranging
ton trainee Jim Woods, Simmons said in the airport today. Commission to lease the airport from from small two-seat,
when Woods got off the bus at the base Simmons noted with a sense of pride the investment company who operated single-engine propeller
in San Antonio, Texas, the duty offi- the fact that the two postwar flight it in the interim. aircraft up to much larger

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March 4, 2022 Aerotech News and Review 5
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