Hope Municipal Airport is a city-owned public-use

airport An airport is an aerodrome with extended facilities, mostly for commercial air transport. Airports usually consists of a landing area, which comprises an aerially accessible open space including at least one operationally active surface ...

located four

nautical mile A nautical mile is a unit of length used in air, marine, and space navigation, and for the definition of territorial waters. Historically, it was defined as the meridian arc length corresponding to one minute ( of a degree) of latitude. Today ...

s (5 mi, 7 km) northwest of the

central business district A central business district (CBD) is the commercial and business centre of a city. It contains commercial space and offices, and in larger cities will often be described as a financial district. Geographically, it often coincides with the "city ...

Hope Hope is an optimistic state of mind that is based on an expectation of positive outcomes with respect to events and circumstances in one's life or the world at large. As a verb, its definitions include: "expect with confidence" and "to cherish ...

, a city in

Hempstead County Hempstead County is a county located in the U.S. state of Arkansas. As of the 2010 census, the population was 22,609. As of the 2020 census, the population decreased to 20,065. The county seat is Hope. Hempstead County is Arkansas's fourth cou ...

Arkansas Arkansas ( ) is a landlocked state in the South Central United States. It is bordered by Missouri to the north, Tennessee and Mississippi to the east, Louisiana to the south, and Texas and Oklahoma to the west. Its name is from the Osage ...

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territorie ...

. It is included in the

National Plan of Integrated Airport Systems The National Plan of Integrated Airport Systems (NPIAS) is an inventory of U.S. aviation infrastructure assets. NPIAS was developed and now maintained by the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA). It identifies existing and proposed airports tha ...

for 2015–2019, which

categorized Categorization is the ability and activity of recognizing shared features or similarities between the elements of the experience of the world (such as objects, events, or ideas), organizing and classifying experience by associating them to a ...

it as a ''

general aviation General aviation (GA) is defined by the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) as all civil aviation aircraft operations with the exception of commercial air transport or aerial work, which is defined as specialized aviation services ...

'' airport. In the aftermath of

Hurricane Katrina Hurricane Katrina was a destructive Category 5 Atlantic hurricane that caused over 1,800 fatalities and $125 billion in damage in late August 2005, especially in the city of New Orleans and the surrounding areas. It was at the time the cost ...

, the

Federal Emergency Management Agency The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) is an agency of the United States Department of Homeland Security (DHS), initially created under President Jimmy Carter by Presidential Reorganization Plan No. 3 of 1978 and implemented by two Exec ...

signed a $25,000-per-month lease with the city to use at the Hope Municipal Airport as a staging area for trailers. About 12,000 travel trailers and 8,300 mobile homes sat at the airport. Many of them were never used by the victims of Hurricane Katrina or other emergency.

History

World War II

The Southwestern Proving Ground (SWPG) was utilized during World War II as an airfield for bombers and a testing ground for artillery shells and air bombs. The proving ground was in operation from 1941 to 1945 and was a major employer of Hempstead, Howard, Nevada, Clark and Lafayette counties. The construction of the Southwestern Proving Ground was part of the U.S. Government's National Defense Program which provided factories for the manufacture of munitions, airplanes and tanks in preparation for an eventual war. The news of construction on a proving ground in Hope became official in June 1941. The Real Estate Department of the War Department was in charge of acquiring land by filing condemnation proceedings against the tract and then taking possession of those sections they required to begin immediate work. After the initial evacuation order the War Department decided they needed more room for an airport so they added more acres. In the end 404 families were relocated by a deadline of July 24. Callahan Construction Company was awarded the job of erecting the proving ground by the War Department and the hiring of 4,000 construction workers began July 15. Senator Spencer and the project director, W.K. Mellyor, agreed upon a guarantee of preferential treatment of local citizens in considerations for jobs. When the airport was completed it had the third longest runway in the United States. Opening day festivities were postponed because of the bombing of Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941. The Army Air Force Proving Ground Command 616th Army Air Corps Detachment used the facility primarily to test ammunition during World War II. Testing began in January 1942 and Hempstead County residents were finally allowed within the gates of the proving ground in April. Troops explored the capabilities of LaBolenge chronographs and solenoid chronographs (two different instruments that record time intervals) for accuracy and reliability. 105-mm shells that had fired prematurely in battle were determined by research at SWPG to have faulty rotating bands, thus saving the lives of American troops. B-25s were sent from the airport in Hope to the Gulf of Mexico to observe the testing of bombs for tumbling and proper ballistics after being fired. After World War II the city of Hope received the Southwestern Proving Ground Airport, which became Hope Municipal Airport in 1947.

Historic District

The Southwestern Proving Ground Airport Historic District, listed 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 2008, is composed of six buildings and five structures, which include the hangar, night landing plant, heating plant, storage building, garage, bomb assembly building, high explosives magazine and concrete runways and hangar apron. The magazine and bomb assembly building are located on adjacent land under private ownership. The remaining five buildings are located on owned by Hope Municipal Airport. The hangar is located to the west of U.S. Highway 278 and is surrounded by a concrete apron on all sides. The building is constructed of brick in a restrained Art Deco style on a continuous concrete foundation with a barrel vaulted roof and four corner towers. The interior of the hangar covers a total of . The night landing plant is adjacent to the hangar and is about from its southeastern corner. The plant is a very simple one-story rectangular brick edifice with a flat roof. The steam heating plant is located east of the hangar, across Airport Road. During the operation of SWPG this building generated steam heat to warm the buildings in the entire complex. The plant currently houses the Paul W. Klipsch Education Center, the educational component of the Klipsch Heritage Museum Association, Inc. The storage building to the south of the steam heating plant is a rectangular vernacular building with a gable roof. The bomb assembly building is southwest of the hangar and is located on private property within a chain link fence. Bombs were assembled in this building and hauled by truck to Lake Charles, Louisiana, for testing. The high-explosives building is located on private property and is south of the bomb assembly building, outside of the fenced-in area.

Facilities and aircraft

Hope Municipal Airport covers an area of 1,575

acre The acre is a unit of land area used in the imperial Imperial is that which relates to an empire, emperor, or imperialism. Imperial or The Imperial may also refer to: Places United States * Imperial, California * Imperial, Missouri * Imp ...

s (637 ha) at an

elevation The elevation of a geographic location is its height above or below a fixed reference point, most commonly a reference geoid, a mathematical model of the Earth's sea level as an equipotential gravitational surface (see Geodetic datum § Vert ...

of 359 feet (109 m) above

mean sea level There are several kinds of mean in mathematics Mathematics is an area of knowledge that includes the topics of numbers, formulas and related structures, shapes and the spaces in which they are contained, and quantities and their changes. ...

. It has two

runway According to the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO), a runway is a "defined rectangular area on a land aerodrome prepared for the landing and takeoff of aircraft". Runways may be a man-made surface (often asphalt concrete, as ...

s with

concrete Concrete is a composite material composed of fine and coarse aggregate bonded together with a fluid cement (cement paste) that hardens (cures) over time. Concrete is the second-most-used substance in the world after water, and is the most wi ...

surfaces: 4/22 is 5,560 by 150 feet (1,695 x 46 m) and 16/34 is 5,501 by 150 feet (1,677 x 46 m). For the 12-month period ending December 31, 2010, the airport had 8,000 aircraft operations, an average of 21 per day: 94%

and 6%

military A military, also known collectively as armed forces, is a heavily armed, highly organized force primarily intended for warfare. It is typically authorized and maintained by a sovereign state, with its members identifiable by their distinct ...

. At that time there were 26 aircraft based at this airport: 88.5% single-

engine An engine or motor is a machine designed to convert one or more forms of energy into mechanical energy. Available energy sources include potential energy (e.g. energy of the Earth's gravitational field as exploited in hydroelectric power gen ...

, and 11.5% multi-engine.

References

External links

The Southwestern Proving Ground

Aerial image as of March 2000
from

USGS The United States Geological Survey (USGS), formerly simply known as the Geological Survey, is a scientific agency of the United States government. The scientists of the USGS study the landscape of the United States, its natural resources, a ...

The National Map ''The National Map'' is a collaborative effort of the United States Geological Survey (USGS) and other federal, state, and local agencies to improve and deliver topographic information for the United States. The purpose of the effort is to prov ...