Fort MacArthur is a former

United States Army The United States Army (USA) is the land service branch of the United States Armed Forces. It is one of the eight U.S. uniformed services, and is designated as the Army of the United States in the U.S. Constitution.Article II, section 2, cla ...

installation in

San Pedro, Los Angeles, California San Pedro ( ; Spanish: " St. Peter") is a neighborhood within the City of Los Angeles, California. Formerly a separate city, it consolidated with Los Angeles in 1909. The Port of Los Angeles, a major international seaport, is partially located wi ...

(now the

port A port is a maritime facility comprising one or more wharves or loading areas, where ships load and discharge cargo and passengers. Although usually situated on a sea coast or estuary, ports can also be found far inland, such as Ham ...

community of

Los Angeles Los Angeles ( ; es, Los Ángeles, link=no , ), often referred to by its initials L.A., is the largest city in the state of California and the second most populous city in the United States after New York City, as well as one of the world' ...

). A small section remains in military use by the

United States Air Force The United States Air Force (USAF) is the air service branch of the United States Armed Forces, and is one of the eight uniformed services of the United States. Originally created on 1 August 1907, as a part of the United States Army Signal ...

as a housing and administrative annex of

Los Angeles Air Force Base Los Angeles Air Force Base (LAAFB) is a United States Space Force Base located in El Segundo, California. Los Angeles Air Force Base houses and supports the headquarters of the United States Space Force's Space Systems Command (SSC), which ...

. The fort is named after Lieutenant General Arthur MacArthur. His son,

Douglas MacArthur Douglas MacArthur (26 January 18805 April 1964) was an American military leader who served as General of the Army for the United States, as well as a field marshal to the Philippine Army. He had served with distinction in World War I, was C ...

, would later command American forces in the Pacific during

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

History

In 1888, President

Grover Cleveland Stephen Grover Cleveland (March 18, 1837June 24, 1908) was an American lawyer and politician who served as the 22nd and 24th president of the United States from 1885 to 1889 and from 1893 to 1897. Cleveland is the only president in American ...

designated an area overlooking San Pedro Bay as an unnamed military reservation intended to improve the defenses of the expanding Los Angeles harbor area. Additional land was purchased in 1897 and 1910, and Fort MacArthur was formally created on October 31, 1914. The fort was a training center during

World War I World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...

, and the first large gun batteries for harbor defense were installed in 1917. The effectiveness of these fixed gun emplacements was debated for many years, and test firings were extremely unpopular with nearby residents, the concussion shattering windows in buildings and houses for miles around. In

, Fort MacArthur had a Harbor Entrance Command Post and a Harbor Defense Command Post for US seacoast defense of shipbuilding factories (e.g.,

CalShip __NOTOC__ California Shipbuilding Corporation built 467 Liberty and Victory ships during World War II, including ''Haskell''-class attack transports. California Shipbuilding Corporation was often referred to as Calship. The ''Dictionary of Ame ...

Todd Pacific Todd Pacific Shipyards, Los Angeles Division was a shipyard in San Pedro, Los Angeles, California. Before applying its last corporate name, the shipyard had been called Los Angeles Shipbuilding & Dry Dock Company and Todd Shipyards, Los Angeles ...

), "giant aircraft factories" (

Douglas Douglas may refer to: People * Douglas (given name) * Douglas (surname) Animals *Douglas (parrot), macaw that starred as the parrot ''Rosalinda'' in Pippi Longstocking *Douglas the camel, a camel in the Confederate Army in the American Civil W ...

Hughes Hughes may refer to: People * Hughes (surname) * Hughes (given name) Places Antarctica * Hughes Range (Antarctica), Ross Dependency * Mount Hughes, Oates Land * Hughes Basin, Oates Land * Hughes Bay, Graham Land * Hughes Bluff, Victoria La ...

Martin Martin may refer to: Places * Martin City (disambiguation) * Martin County (disambiguation) * Martin Township (disambiguation) Antarctica * Martin Peninsula, Marie Byrd Land * Port Martin, Adelie Land * Point Martin, South Orkney Islands Austr ...

, Northrop), the

Huntington Beach Oil Field The Huntington Beach Oil Field is part of rich pools of oil found along the West Coast of the United States in the early 1920s stretching from Huntington Beach, California to Santa Barbara, California. History On May 24, 1920, the first Huntingt ...

, and the San Pedro Bay harbor (

Port of Los Angeles The Port of Los Angeles is a seaport managed by the Los Angeles Harbor Department, a unit of the City of Los Angeles. It occupies of land and water with of waterfront and adjoins the separate Port of Long Beach. Promoted as "America's Port", t ...

Port of Long Beach The Port of Long Beach, also known as the Harbor Department of the City of Long Beach, is a container port in the United States, which adjoins Port of Los Angeles. Acting as a major gateway for US–Asian trade, the port occupies of land wit ...

) which made the

Los Angeles metropolitan area Greater Los Angeles is the second-largest metropolitan region in the United States with a population of 18.5 million in 2021, encompassing five counties in Southern California extending from Ventura County in the west to San Bernardino Coun ...

a target for attack. By the end of World War II the large guns were already being removed, with the last decommissioned in 1948. Battery Osgood-Farley is probably the best preserved example of a United States coastal defense gun emplacement, and it was placed on the

National Register of Historic Places The National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) is the United States federal government's official list of districts, sites, buildings, structures and objects deemed worthy of preservation for their historical significance or "great artistic v ...

in 1976. A second site, Battery John Barlow and Saxton, was added to the Register in 1982.

Air defense

During the early years of the

Cold War The Cold War is a term commonly used to refer to a period of geopolitical tension between the United States and the Soviet Union and their respective allies, the Western Bloc and the Eastern Bloc. The term '' cold war'' is used because the ...

, Fort MacArthur became a key part of the

West Coast West Coast or west coast may refer to: Geography Australia * Western Australia *Regions of South Australia#Weather forecasting, West Coast of South Australia * West Coast, Tasmania **West Coast Range, mountain range in the region Canada * Britis ...

anti-aircraft Anti-aircraft warfare, counter-air or air defence forces is the battlespace response to aerial warfare, defined by NATO as "all measures designed to nullify or reduce the effectiveness of hostile air action".AAP-6 It includes surface based, ...

defenses, becoming the home base of the 47th Anti-Aircraft Artillery Brigade. A

Nike Nike often refers to: * Nike (mythology), a Greek goddess who personifies victory * Nike, Inc., a major American producer of athletic shoes, apparel, and sports equipment Nike may also refer to: People * Nike (name), a surname and feminine give ...

surface-to-air missile A surface-to-air missile (SAM), also known as a ground-to-air missile (GTAM) or surface-to-air guided weapon (SAGW), is a missile designed to be launched from the ground to destroy aircraft or other missiles. It is one type of anti-aircraft syst ...

battery was activated at the fort in 1954, remaining in service until the early 1970s. The Fort MacArthur Direction Center (DC) was the U.S.

Army Air Defense Command Post An army (from Old French ''armee'', itself derived from the Latin verb ''armāre'', meaning "to arm", and related to the Latin noun ''arma'', meaning "arms" or "weapons"), ground force or land force is a fighting force that fights primarily on ...

(AADCP) for the

Project Nike Project Nike (Greek: Νίκη, "Victory") was a U.S. Army project, proposed in May 1945 by Bell Laboratories, to develop a line-of-sight anti-aircraft missile system. The project delivered the United States' first operational anti-aircraft mi ...

batteries of the Los Angeles Defense Area. It was located at Fort MacArthur from 1960.

Purpose

The Direction Center provided radar coverage for integrating the area's Integrated Fire Control (IFC) sites ( 16 sites for

MIM-14 Nike-Hercules The Nike Hercules, initially designated SAM-A-25 and later MIM-14, was a surface-to-air missile (SAM) used by U.S. and NATO armed forces for medium- and high-altitude long-range air defense. It was normally armed with the W31 nuclear warhead, bu ...

missiles until 1968). The DC had High Frequency Crosstell communication with the 1959–1966

Semi-Automatic Ground Environment The Semi-Automatic Ground Environment (SAGE) was a system of mainframe computer, large computers and associated computer network, networking equipment that coordinated data from many radar sites and processed it to produce a single unified image ...

(SAGE) Master Direction Center at

Norton Air Force Base Norton Air Force Base (1942–1994) was a United States Air Force facility east of downtown San Bernardino in San Bernardino County, California. Overview For the majority of its operational lifetime, Norton was a logistics depot and heavy-l ...

(DC-17) for coordinating Army intercepts of targets penetrating through the larger USAF

Los Angeles Air Defense Sector The Southwest Air Defense Sector (SWADS) is an inactive United States Air Force organization. Its last assignment was with the First Air Force, being stationed at March Air Force Base, California. It was inactivated on 31 December 1994. L ...

defended by fighter aircraft.

History

During the

Korean War , date = {{Ubl, 25 June 1950 – 27 July 1953 (''de facto'')({{Age in years, months, weeks and days, month1=6, day1=25, year1=1950, month2=7, day2=27, year2=1953), 25 June 1950 – present (''de jure'')({{Age in years, months, weeks a ...

, the fort's L-43

Lashup Radar Network The Lashup Radar Network was a United States Cold War radar netting system for air defense surveillance which followed the post-World War II "five-station radar net" and preceded the "high Priority Permanent System". ROTOR was a similar expedient ...

site provided radar surveillance for the area from 1950 to 1952. The

669th Radar Squadron The 669th Radar Squadron is an inactive United States Air Force unit. It was last assigned to the 27th Air Division, Aerospace Defense Command, stationed at Lompoc Air Force Station, California. It was discontinued on 18 June 1968. The unit was ...

was assigned to the fort on January 1, 1951.compiled by On February 16, 1960, Lt Col James L McCallister was the Missile Director for the defense area. The Fort MacArthur Direction Center began in 1960 with an AN/FSG-1 computer that was the last of 10 installed and which replaced an Interim Battery Data Link (IBDL). The Army dedicated the DC's

Missile Master Missile Master was a type of United States Army, US Army United States Army Space and Missile Defense Command, Missile Command military installation for the Cold War Project Nike, each which were a System of systems, complex of systems and facil ...

bunker with an Antiaircraft Operations Center ("Blue Room") on December 14, 1960, prior to the USAF/FAA

ARSR-1 The Air Route Surveillance Radar is used by the United States Air Force and the Federal Aviation Administration to control airspace within and around the borders of the United States. The ARSR-4 is the FAA's most recent (late 1980s, early 1990s) ...

C radar opening in 1961 at San Pedro Hill Air Force Station. Fort MacArthur's 47th Artillery Brigade operated the DC, and the vacuum tube AN/FSG-1 was replaced on January 31, 1967, with a solid-state

Hughes AN/TSQ-51 Air Defense Command and Coordination System The Hughes AN/TSQ-51 Air Defense Command and Coordination System was a transportable electronic fire distribution center for automated command and control of remote Nike missile launch batteries. The radar netting system replace the vacuum tube A ...

. On November 15, 1968, the 19th Artillery Group (Air Defense) replaced the 47th Artillery Brigade in command of the DC and its batteries. The 19th Group deactivated July 1, 1974, after

Project Concise Project Concise was a United States Army program to close military installations after the Vietnam War. The closures included Nike missile launch sites and command posts including Highlands Army Air Defense Site, Fort Lawton, Fort MacArthur, Fort ...

ended Nike operations. The tennis courts next to the bunker remain at the former site of the AADCP's building 554, map published in Berhow/Gustafson 2002, p. 55. and the Missile Master nuclear bunker (building 550) was razed .

Rundown of the fort

In 1975 Fort MacArthur became a sub-post of

Fort Ord Fort Ord is a former United States Army post on Monterey Bay of the Pacific Ocean coast in California, which closed in 1994 due to Base Realignment and Closure (BRAC) action. Most of the fort's land now makes up the Fort Ord National Monument, m ...

, and the Army transferred ownership of the fort's Upper and Lower Reservations to the City of Los Angeles two years later. The Lower Reservation was cleared off and dredged and is now the city's Cabrillo Marina. Fort MacArthur's remaining Middle Reservation was transferred to the

in 1982 for use by

for administration and housing. In 1989,

Madonna Madonna Louise Ciccone (; ; born August 16, 1958) is an American singer-songwriter and actress. Widely dubbed the " Queen of Pop", Madonna has been noted for her continual reinvention and versatility in music production, songwriting, a ...

filmed some portions of her " Like a Prayer" video there.

Angels Gate Park

The Upper Reservation is now a city park: San Pedro's Angels Gate Park, home of the

Korean Bell of Friendship The Korean Bell of Friendship (more commonly called Korean Friendship Bell) is a massive bronze bell housed in a stone pavilion in Angel's Gate Park, in the San Pedro neighborhood of Los Angeles, California. Located at the corner of Gaffey and ...

. Hostelling International USA (part of

Hostelling International Hostelling International (HI), formerly known as International Youth Hostel Federation (IYHF), is a grouping of more than seventy National Youth Hostel Associations in over eighty countries, with over 4,000 affiliated hostels around the worl ...

) maintained a 57-bed

youth hostel A hostel is a form of low-cost, short-term shared sociable lodging where guests can rent a bed, usually a bunk bed in a dormitory, with shared use of a lounge and sometimes a kitchen. Rooms can be mixed or single-sex and have private or shared ba ...

in the refurbished military barracks of the reservation.

Museum

The Fort MacArthur Military Museum, located at the site of Battery Osgood-Farley, displays exhibits on the history of Fort MacArthur, its role in defending the Los Angeles area, Indo-Pacific Theater military campaigns, and the role of Los Angeles as a military port.

Appearances in popular culture

The

Battle of Los Angeles The Battle of Los Angeles, also known as the Great Los Angeles Air Raid, is the name given by contemporary sources to a rumored attack on the continental United States by Imperial Japan and the subsequent anti-aircraft artillery barrage which ...

and Fort MacArthur Museum are featured in ''

California's Gold ''California's Gold'' is a public television human interest program that explores the natural, cultural, and historical features of California. The series ran for 24 seasons beginning in 1991, and was produced and hosted by Huell Howser in colla ...

'' Episode 6005 with

Huell Howser Huell Burnley Howser (October 18, 1945 – January 7, 2013) was an American television personality, actor, producer, writer, singer, and voice artist, best known for hosting, producing, and writing ''California's Gold'' and his human interest sh ...

. It can be been seen in the television series

The A-Team ''The A-Team'' is an American action-adventure television series that ran on NBC from January 1983 to March 1987 about former members of a fictitious United States Army Special Forces unit. The four members of the team were tried by court marti ...

, '' 24'' and in films including '' Dragnet'', '' Midway'' and ''

Tora! Tora! Tora! ''Tora! Tora! Tora!'' ( ja, トラ・トラ・トラ！) is a 1970 epic film, epic war film that dramatizes the Empire of Japan, Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941. The film was produced by Elmo Williams and directed by Richard Fleischer, T ...

''.

References

External links

Ftmac.org: 47th Artillery Brigade

Official Fort MacArthur Military Museum website

* ttps://web.archive.org/web/20090310032551/http://www.mylaafbguide.com/ Los Angeles Air Force Base Military Directory* {{DEFAULTSORT:Fort Macarthur MacArthur Parks in Los Angeles Museums in Los Angeles Military and war museums in California Palos Verdes Peninsula San Pedro, Los Angeles Closed installations of the United States Army Formerly Used Defense Sites in California Military facilities in Greater Los Angeles Military installations closed in 1982 Historic districts in Los Angeles Los Angeles Historic-Cultural Monuments

McArthur McArthur may refer to: People * McArthur (surname) Geography * McArthur, Arkansas, an unincorporated town in Desha County * McArthur, California, in Shasta County * McArthur, Modoc County, California * McArthur, Ohio * McArthur Basin, a large int ...

Historic districts on the National Register of Historic Places in California Military facilities on the National Register of Historic Places in Los Angeles National Register of Historic Places in Los Angeles 1916 establishments in California Spanish Colonial Revival architecture in California Military installations established in 1916

History

Air defense

Purpose

History

Rundown of the fort

Angels Gate Park

Museum

Appearances in popular culture

See also

References

External links