reesetechnologycenter.com - NewsRadio 1420- Anniversary #5

NewsRadio 1420- Anniversary #5

There Was Something Very, Very Special About Reese

By: James Clark

Sunday is the 10-year anniversary when Air Force officials handed over security to local enforcement and said goodbye.

Reese tower operations in the 1940's

We continue our weeklong series of special reports… 10 years since we said goodbye to Reese Air Force Base. It was 10 years ago this coming Sunday that orders were read out loud, speeches were given, the flags were lowered, and the base was ceremonially closed.

News Radio 1420 has been looking for Air Force veterans and one of them we found is Dan Sanders. Currently he is the CEO of United Supermarkets. He served twice at Reese Air Force Base… once as a training pilot, and later as an instructor pilot.

Reese Air Force Base flight line in 1994

Sanders says, “Well, I was very, very disappointed for a lot of reasons. Obviously I had a fair amount of sweat equity in that base.” Beyond the purely emotional aspect there were practical reasons to be disappointed that BRAC decided to close Reese.

He says, “From a more operational perspective it bothered me because Reese Air Force Base really put out some great pilots in part because as you probably know the runway configuration at Reese is north and south. And we have a prevailing westerly wind. And so, Reese pilots had to learn how to fly in crosswinds.”

Early training planes at the base

Sanders says there was something very, very special about Reese. It made the Reese the ‘gem’ of the Air Force training operations. “We had a host program where families in the community would take a student, sometimes two under their wings for a year or a year-and-a-half that they were stationed here going through training. And as a result of that there were life long friendships and relationships established.”

Sanders retired from the Air Force in 1993 at the rank of Major.

Some Personal Thoughts

I was there personally for the base closing ceremony. It was one of those late fall mornings where it cool in the shade but scorching hot in the sun. I reported live from the base that day for KAMC 28. It just seemed to me that there was a tremendous sense of historic weight to the day. This was much more than the loss of jobs. The base was a source of intense pride and there were so many people who felt like the base was unfairly taken from Lubbock.

Of course, you can take away the air base. You can’t take away the memories. Todd Reno with Reese Technology Center found some old photos and shared them with us. We’ll post them to our web site at NewsRadio1420.com. Reese Air Force Base… ending its tour of duty 10 years ago this week.

NewsRadio 1420 Link

Story Posted: Fri Sep 28 06:30:00 CDT 2007
Created: Fri Sep 28 06:27:21 CDT 2007

[ Back ]