On April 21, 1941, New York City Mayor Fiorello LaGuardia dedicated the Charlotte Douglas International Airport in front of a crowd nearly 10,000 local residents.
The airport has its roots in Morris Field, which was constructed in 1936 with funds from the Works Progress Administration at the urging of local business leaders. With the U.S. entry into World War II in 1941, the Army Air Corps took control of the field and transformed it into an airbase to support several large military facilities in the Charlotte region.
In May 1946 the Air Corps vacated Morris Field. Charlotte officials then converted the base’s structures into apartment buildings to relieve the postwar housing shortage. The airport is named after Mayor Ben E. Douglas who was instrumental in the completion of the airport project.
Other related resources:
- Aviation in North Carolina and other aviation-related articles on NCpedia
Image from the Carolinas Historic Aviation Commission / Charlotte-Mecklenburg Historic Landmarks Commission.