Del Valle Army Air Base (Bergstrom Air Force Base)
Austin, Travis County, Texas
Marker Inscription
(Bergstrom Air Force Base) Following the U.S. entry into World War II, the Army Air Corps established a base here in the Del Valle community on land once a part of the Santiago del Valle Mexican land grant. The City of Austin purchased 3,000 acres to lease to the federal government for use as an air base. Construction began in May 1942 after the removal of homes, churches and businesses, and the first units of the 316th Troop Carrier Group arrived in late September. The base was a replacement center for the First Troop Carrier Command, training pilots to transport combat troops and supplies. In March 1943, the base was renamed Bergstrom Army Air Field to honor Captain John August Earl Bergstrom, Austin's first casualty of war; he was killed at Clark Field in the Phillipines on December 8, 1941. The base name was shortened to Bergstrom Field in November 1943. Crews from Bergstrom saw duty in the invasions of Normandy, southern France, Holland and Germany. After the war, the air field became Bergstrom Air Force Base, assigned to the Continental Air Command, and planes from here participated in the Berlin Airlift, 1948-49. Over the next 50 years, Bergstrom served as part of both the Strategic Air Command and the Tactical Air Command, sending bombers and reconnaisance aircraft into combat theaters from Korea to Iraq. In 1968, the 12th Air Force moved its headquarters here to a newly completed circular building, nicknamed the "Roundagon." Bergstrom Air Force Base closed in 1992 in compliance with the Base Realignment and Closure Commission, and the city converted it to Austin-Bergstrom International Airport in 1999. Texas in World War II, V+60 (2005)
Erected by Texas Historical Commission
The Story
Soon after the United States entered World War II, the Army Air Corps established an air base on Del Valle land once part of a Mexican land grant, with the City of Austin buying 3,000 acres to lease to the government. Opened in 1942 as a troop-carrier training center, it was renamed for Capt. John A. E. Bergstrom, Austin's first war casualty, killed at Clark Field in the Philippines in December 1941. Crews trained here flew in the invasions of Normandy and beyond, and over the next half-century the base served through the Berlin Airlift, Korea, and Iraq before closing in 1992 and becoming Austin's international airport in 1999.
Why it matters
From a WWII troop-carrier field to a Cold War strategic base to a civilian airport, Bergstrom traces the changing role of American military aviation and its lasting mark on Austin.
The story behind this marker
AI contextThe era
In the anxious months after the United States entered World War II, the country raced to turn open land into airfields. The war would be won in large part in the air and by the ability to move troops and supplies fast and far — and that meant runways, and lots of them, carved out of the American landscape wherever the ground and the weather cooperated. Central Texas, with its wide skies and room to spread out, was ideal.
The ground chosen here, in the Del Valle community outside Austin, carried its own long history. It had once been part of the Santiago del Valle Mexican land grant, a reminder that this stretch of Texas had belonged in turn to different nations and peoples long before the Army Air Corps arrived. Now it was being folded into a national war effort.
To make the base happen, the City of Austin purchased 3,000 acres to lease to the federal government. Construction began in May 1942 — but not before homes, churches, and businesses were removed to clear the ground. From the start, the airfield's creation meant asking a community to give way to the demands of a country at war.
People & events
The first units of the 316th Troop Carrier Group arrived in late September 1942, and the base's mission took shape: it was a replacement center for the First Troop Carrier Command, training the pilots who would fly troops and supplies into the heart of combat. This was not glamorous fighter work; it was the demanding, indispensable job of carrying soldiers and cargo where they were needed, often into danger.
In March 1943 the base received the name it would carry for half a century, honoring Captain John August Earl Bergstrom. Bergstrom was Austin's first casualty of the war, killed at Clark Field in the Philippines on December 8, 1941 — in the war's very first days. Naming the field for a hometown man lost so early gave the place a personal weight; every crew trained here did so under the name of a local son who never came home.
The pilots who trained at Bergstrom went on to some of the war's pivotal moments, flying in the invasions of Normandy, southern France, Holland, and Germany. And the base did not fade when the war ended. It became Bergstrom Air Force Base, and its planes took part in the Berlin Airlift of 1948–49. Over the next fifty years it served under both the Strategic Air Command and the Tactical Air Command, sending bombers and reconnaissance aircraft toward conflicts from Korea to Iraq. In 1968 the 12th Air Force moved its headquarters into a distinctive new circular building here, quickly nicknamed the "Roundagon."
Its place in the American story
Bergstrom's long life traces the whole modern history of American air power in one place. It began as a World War II troop-carrier field, matured into a Cold War strategic base, and ended as a civilian airport — a single stretch of Texas ground that mirrored the changing shape of the nation's military and its wars.
The base's reach is a map of American conflict across two generations: Normandy and the liberation of Western Europe, the Berlin Airlift's tense standoff, and combat theaters from Korea to Iraq. Few places connect so directly to so many chapters of the country's twentieth-century story, all flowing through the same runways.
And its final chapter speaks to something distinctly American too. When Bergstrom closed in 1992 under the Base Realignment and Closure Commission, the land did not simply go quiet. In 1999 the city converted it into Austin-Bergstrom International Airport — a swords-into-plowshares transformation that kept the name, and the memory, alive in the daily life of a booming city.
If you visit
Here is the rare historic marker you might pass on your way to catch a flight. The site is now Austin's international airport, which means the ground that once trained wartime pilots still hums with aircraft every day — a living continuity you can feel if you pause to notice it.
As you read the marker, let the layers settle over one another: a Mexican land grant, a community cleared away in 1942, decades of military aviation, and now the gateway through which millions of travelers pass. Look, too, for the name itself, and remember that it honors a young Austin officer lost in the opening days of the war — a personal thread running through all that machinery of history.
For a traveler, this is a fine anchor point for exploring how deeply military aviation is stitched into Central Texas. Whether you are flying in or simply driving past, take a moment to consider that the busy airport around you began as a wartime field — and that the runways beneath the airliners have been in service, in one form or another, for the better part of a century.
Written by AI to add context, grounded in the marker’s inscription and the historical record. The inscription above is the original, unaltered text.
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Related people
- · John August Earl Bergstrom
Themes & tags
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