Brookley Air Force Base, Alabama

Built on the site of Mobile's original Bates Field municipal airport (established 1929), the Army Air Corps took over the 1,000-acre site in 1938, establishing Brookley Army Air Field.

Located on Mobile Bay with excellent flying weather and a deepwater port, it became the major Army Air Forces supply and maintenance depot for the Air Materiel Command in the southeastern United States during WWII, employing 17,000 civilians at its wartime peak.

Notable WWII project: Operation Ivory Soap (1944), a top-secret program converting 24 liberty ships into floating B-29 and P-51 repair and maintenance units. Also calibrated the top-secret Norden Bombsight. Renamed Brookley AFB in 1948. By the 1960s employed nearly 13,000. Closure announced in 1964 by Secretary of Defense McNamara (widely suspected as political retaliation by President Johnson after Alabama voted for Goldwater in 1964).

Officially closed June 30, 1969, at the time the largest base closure in U.S. history, eliminating roughly 10% of Mobile's workforce. The site was returned to the City of Mobile. Today it is the Mobile Aeroplex at Brookley, home to the only Airbus final assembly facility in the United States and dozens of aerospace tenants.