Qualla: Wheeler Army Airfield

Wheeler Army Airfield: Introduction

Thu, 12 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Japanese aircrew, Public domain. Amelia Earhart landed here twice -- once in 1935 in her Lockheed Vega, again in 1937 in the Electra that would carry her into the Pacific and out of history. Wheeler Field hosted the first transpacific flight from California in 1927, the Dole Air Race, and Charles Kingsford Smith's Southern Cross on its way to Australia. Then, on the morning of December 7, 1941, Japanese aircraft hit Wheeler before they hit Pearl Harbor, destroying or damaging most of the fighter planes that might have mounted a defense. The airfield that had been a stage for aviation's golden age became, in a single morning, a symbol of the cost of being caught unprepared.

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Image: Japanese aircrew | Public domain

Wheeler Army Airfield: Canvas Hangars and Guava Trees

Thu, 12 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Air Force Historical Research Agency, Public domain. Wheeler Field began on February 6, 1922, when twenty enlisted men from Luke Field on Ford Island arrived at Schofield Barracks to clear a patch of ground that had served as the 17th Cavalry Regiment's drill field. They pulled out weeds, guava, and algaroba trees, and erected two ...

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Image: Air Force Historical Research Agency | Public domain

Wheeler Army Airfield: Seven Minutes Before Pearl Harbor

Thu, 12 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Japanese aircrew, Public domain. Wheeler was the first target on December 7, 1941. Japanese aircraft attacked the fighter base to neutralize the planes that could have opposed the main strike on Pearl Harbor. The results were devastating: 33 killed, 75 wounded, 76 aircraft destroyed outright, and many more damag...

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Image: Japanese aircrew | Public domain

Wheeler Army Airfield: Garden City in Uniform

Thu, 12 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Japanese aircrew, Public domain. What makes Wheeler physically distinctive has nothing to do with runways. The residential areas were designed according to the Garden City principles of Sir Ebenezer Howard, the English planner who conceived neighborhoods as antidotes to the industrial company towns that had blig...

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Image: Japanese aircrew | Public domain

Wheeler Army Airfield: An Airfield That Changed Hands

Thu, 12 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit United States Army, Public domain. On November 1, 1991, the Army held a quiet ceremony and changed the sign at the main gate from Wheeler Air Force Base to Wheeler Army Airfield. The transfer from Air Force to Army control ended decades of split identity, though the paperwork took until 1993 to finalize when the A...

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Image: United States Army | Public domain