McGuire AFB/McGuire, the common name of the McGuire unit of Joint Base McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst, is a United States Air Force base in Burlington County, in the U.S. state of New Jersey, approximately south-southeast of Trenton. McGuire is under the jurisdiction of the Air Mobility Command. It was consolidated with two adjoining US Army and Navy facilities to become part of Joint Base McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst (JB MDL) on 1 October 2009.
The McGuire Air Force Base census-designated place (CDP) is located in portions of both New Hanover Township and North Hanover Township.GCT-PH1 – Population, Housing Units, Area, and Density: 2010 – County – County Subdivision and Place from the 2010 Census Summary File 1 for Burlington County, New Jersey , United States Census Bureau. Accessed 18 June 2013.2006–2010 American Community Survey Geography for New Jersey, United States Census Bureau. Accessed 18 June 2013.New Jersey: 2010 – Population and Housing Unit Counts – 2010 Census of Population and Housing (CPH-2-32), United States Census Bureau, p. III-5, August 2012. Accessed 18 June 2013. As of the 2020 United States census, the McGuire Air Force Base CDP had a total population of 4,522.
Overview The host unit at McGuire AFB is the 87th Air Base Wing (87 ABW), United States Air Force Expeditionary Center, AMC. The 87 ABW provides installation management to all of JB MDL.Mission Partners webpage. Joint Base McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst (JB MDL) official website. Accessed 2010-06-18. The wing also provides mission-ready, expeditionary Airmen to support Unified Combatant Commanders in ongoing military operations. The wing consists of more than 3,100 officers, enlisted, and civilian personnel from the Air Force, Army and Navy. The 87th Air Base Wing is commanded by Colonel Bridget V. Gigliotti. Its Command Chief Master Sergeant is Chief Master Sergeant Tony B. Jenkins.
McGuire originated in 1941 as Fort Dix Army Airfield. Closed briefly after World War II, it reopened in 1948 as McGuire Air Force Base. The base was named after Major Thomas B. McGuire Jr., Medal of Honor recipient, and the second leading ace in American history.
March 3, 1960, while returning home from his army stint, Elvis Presley landed on McGuire Airforce Base, en route from Frankfurt, Germany; and Glasgow Prestwick Airport, Prestwick, Scotland; and Ernest Harmon Air Force Base, Stephenville, Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada. Here he disembarked the airplane, two days before his army discharge.
Units The 305th Air Mobility Wing, 108th Air Refueling Wing (ANG), 621st Contingency Response Wing, and the 514th Air Mobility Wing (AFRC), has supported every major type of air mobility mission over the past 15 years. The following units are assigned to McGuire AFB: 87th Air Base Wing 305th Air Mobility Wing 514th Air Mobility Wing (AFRC) 108th Air Refueling Wing (New Jersey ANG) Marine Aircraft Group 49 (MAG-49) (U.S. Marine Corps Reserve / 4th Marine Aircraft Wing) Marine Helicopter Light Attack Squadron 773 (HMLA-773) (U.S. Marine Corps Reserve / MAG-49) Fleet Logistics Support Squadron 64 (VR-64) (U.S. Navy Reserve)
McGuire is the only base in both the Air Mobility Command and the entire U.S. Air Force hosting three AMC-gained flying wings of the Regular Air Force, Air Force Reserve and Air National Guard.
McGuire is also host to: United States Air Force Expeditionary Center (USAF EC)—physically located on Fort Dix 621st Contingency Response Wing (CRW) 373rd Training Squadron (373 TRS), Detachment 1 AMC Test and Evaluation Squadron (TES)
McGuire hosts the flying needs of its mission partners on JB MDL. Air Force and civilian AMC-contracted aircraft use McGuire's two runways to facilitate this mission. Many hundreds of thousands of Air Force, Army, Navy, and Marine Corps personnel have left the United States for overseas locations from McGuire AFB.
Airplanes from McGuire have provided the flyovers for Philadelphia Eagles games and Major League Baseball All-Star and World Series games played in Philadelphia at the end of the National Anthem. These same planes were also responsible for the Super Bowl XLVIII flyover and missing-man formation which came at the end of opera star Renee Fleming's rendition of the National Anthem.
History
Major Thomas Buchanan McGuire, Jr McGuire Air Force Base was established as Fort Dix Airport in 1937 and first opened to military aircraft on 9 January 1941. On 13 January 1948 the United States Air Force renamed the facility McGuire Air Force Base in honor of Major Thomas Buchanan McGuire Jr., (1920–1945). Medal of Honor recipient and second place American flying ace of World War II, Major McGuire died on 7 January 1945 when his P-38 Lightning spun out of control and crashed on Negros Island in the Philippines as he attempted to aid his wingman during an aerial dogfight.
World War II Flight operations to support Camp Dix at an adjacent airfield took place as early as 1926. Facilities and runways to support an air mission began in 1937 as a Civilian Conservation Corps project. This was on newly acquired land for the great Army Air Forces expansion approved by the Roosevelt Administration. This nascent airfield and wooden structures was named "Rudd Field." To meet the requirements for a possible world war, Rudd Field was renamed Fort Dix Army Air Base in 1939, and underwent massive expansion from 1940 to 1941. Runways constructed consisted of three concrete surfaced, 7100x150(N/S), 7100x150(NE/SW), 5400x150(E/W), and one macadam surfaced, 8100x150(NW/SE).
The base had its first permanent Army Air Force occupant in November 1941 when the 59th Observation Group took up station on 14 November. Initially during 1941–42 the Group operated a wide range of aircraft, including the BC-1A, L-59, O-46, O-47, O-49 Vigilant, and O-52 Owl, engaging in antisubmarine patrols along the East coast.
After the United States' entry into World War II, Fort Dix Army Air Base was used as a training and facility for numerous service units under First Air Force. Once organized and prepared for overseas duty, these units provided support and technical sections for the group requirements as a whole: Flying control, Ordnance, airfield security, firefighting, Post Exchange (PX), Special Services, Mail, Transportation ("motor pool"), Communications, Radar, Gunnery instruction, Personal Equipment, and Weather (Meteorology). The service group also had its own mess section. The service group had approximately 30 officers and 300 to 400 enlisted men. This training continued until 1944.
In late 1942, Army Air Forces Antisubmarine Command (AAFASC) took up tenant status at Fort Dix AAB. The 378th Bombardment Group patrolled with a mission to search for German U-boats in the coastal waters of the Atlantic Coast and to fly aerial coverage of friendly convoys off the east coast with Douglas O-46 and North American O-47 light observation planes. In August 1943, this mission was turned over to the United States Navy.
Air Technical Service Command began using the base in 1943 overhauling, servicing and preparing aircraft for overseas shipment to North Africa and to the United Kingdom. This mission continued until the end of the war in 1945, then received returning aircraft from Europe and arranged their shipment to operational bases or to storage locations. Part of this mission was the temporary basing of returning combat (primarily bombardment) groups from the overseas combat theaters and, with the Army Service Forces coordinating their inactivation.
Fort Dix Army Air Base was phased down in the fall of 1945 and was placed on Temporary Inactive Status on 15 February 1945; which changed to Inactive Status on 1 March 1946. Jurisdiction of the base was transferred to Strategic Air Command at Andrews Field, Maryland on 1 August 1947, the base remaining in inactive status.
United States Air Force
Strategic Air Command Fort Dix Army Air Base was taken out of inactive status and activated as a primary installation on 29 August 1948. Initially reactivated under Strategic Air Command, the facility underwent a modernization program to convert the World War II base into a base for postwar jet aircraft. In addition, support facilities were upgraded from World War II temporary wooden structures to permanent structures for long-term use.
SAC activated the 91st Strategic Reconnaissance Wing at the newly re-designated McGuire Air Force Base on 10 November 1948. The 91st SRW was a long-range photographic reconnaissance unit equipped with a mixture of RB-17 Flying Fortresses and RB-29 Superfortresses equipped with wide variety of photographic reconnaissance and mapping cameras in the bomb bays. It moved to Barksdale Air Force Base, Louisiana, on 1 October 1949.
Air Defense Command
With the departure of the 91st SRW, control of McGuire AFB was reassigned to Continental Air Command (ConAC). ConAC assigned the base to Air Defense Command (ADC), at the time an operating agency of ConAC. ADC took jurisdiction of the base on 1 January 1951 with its re-establishment as a separate major command.
The 52d Fighter Wing, All Weather was assigned to the base, being moved from Mitchel Field, Long Island on 4 October 1949. Equipped with very long-range F-82 Twin Mustangs, the 52d Fighter Group, All Weather engaged in interceptor training missions against SAC B-29 and B-50 Superfortress bombers simulating air defense missions against incoming Soviet Tupolev Tu-4 bombers. The 52d remained at McGuire until 6 February 1952, when it was inactivated along with the F-82s.
The Twin Mustangs of the 52d FW were replaced by the ADC 4709th Defense Wing on 1 February 1952. Under the Eastern Air Defense Force, the 4709th DW (later Air Defense Wing), controlled interceptor squadrons at McGuire, as well as at Suffolk County AFB and Stewart AFB, New York, and Dover AFB, Delaware. Interceptor squadrons stationed at McGuire were the 2d Fighter-Interceptor Squadron and 5th Fighter-Interceptor Squadron. These were replaced in 1955 by the 332d Fighter-Interceptor Squadron and 539th Fighter-Interceptor Squadron.
These squadrons flew a variety of ADC interceptors in the 1950s, starting with the F-94 Starfire in 1952, upgrading to the F-84 Thunderjet in 1953, and finally the interceptor F-86D Sabre later in 1953.
Military Air Transport Service took over jurisdiction of McGuire AFB on 1 July 1954 and took over the flight line of McGuire in 1956, with the ADC interceptors being reassigned. Air Defense Command became a tenant organization on the base, with the 4709th ADW being re-designated as first the 4621st Air Defense Wing on 1 April 1956, and shortly afterwards as the New York Air Defense Sector (NYADS) on 1 October 1956 under the 26th Air Division.
The NYADS was in large part responsible for one of the foundational projects of the computer era: the development of the SAGE (Semi-Automatic Ground Environment) air defense system, from its first test at Bedford, Massachusetts, in 1951, to the installation of the first operational Data Center (DC-01) at McGuire AFB in 1957, becoming operational on 1 July 1958. The SAGE system was a network linking Air Force (and later FAA) General Surveillance Radar stations into a centralized center for Air Defense, intended to provide early warning and response for a Soviet nuclear attack.
Developed by Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) engineers and scientists, SAGE monitored North American skies for possible attack by crewed aircraft and missiles for 25 years. The heart of the system, the AN/FSQ-7 computer, was the first computer to have an internal memory composed of "magnetic cores," thousands of tiny ferrite rings that served as reversible electromagnets. SAGE also introduced computer-driven displays, online terminals, time sharing, high-reliability computation, digital signal processing, digital transmission over telephone lines, digital track-while-scan, digital simulation, computer networking, and duplex computing.