Bishop, Big Pine, Independence, and Lone Pine airports were all born after a dialog between Los Angeles and Inyo County; a partnership was formed using land exchanges resulting in County run airports.  Construction began on the first Bishop airport in March 22, 1928.

In 1939, as war was becoming imminent,  the National Defense program assigned Bishop and Lone Pine airports with a Class 1 designation, and Independence was assigned an emergency designation, which led to funding for airport expansion, and allowed for the airfields to be put to direct use by the military.   

A flying school was set up at the Lone Pine airport utilizing Curtis Robin airplanes for instruction.  Bishop High School started an aviation mechanic’s course.  Inyo County was awarded over $500,000 in 1941 to update valley airports to military specifications,  including instructions for an airfield at Manzanar.

After the bombing of Pearl Harbor, all private fields up to 150 miles inland of the coast were closed, which made the Owens Valley an in-demand location for aviation training.   

Paul Mantz, a movie stunt pilot, moved his pilots and planes to Lone Pine, where he shared the field with the CPT program - Civilian Pilot Training Program.  Lone Pine airport was a very busy place in the 40s, with 125 Naval cadets awarded primary wings at graduation on April 16, 1943.

In May 1943, Jean Barkley Hutchinson Davis and friend Janet Hargrave signed up for 50 hours of instruction with Harry Ross Aeronautics of Independence to qualify for the Women’s Air Force Special Pilots program in Texas.  According to Jean’s memoirs, Harry Ross, 27, was “handsome, forceful and enthusiastic.” (County of Inyo, Eastern California Museum: “First Landing”)  Emil Hesse was the other instructor.  At that time there were 50 CTP boys flying at Manzanar, living in Independence.  Harry had four Luscombes and a Taylorcraft.  

In the 40s a fighter was designed for the Navy and Marines called the F-4U Corsair for use on aircraft carriers.  The Corsair had a flaw which caused the tail to bounce in landing, (thus making it difficult to near impossible to catch the tail hook on the arrest cable.) Bishop Army Air Field was very involved in working on this problem, with 200 Marine pilots arriving to practice bounce training. The Corsair ended up being relegated to Marine use on land based fields.

After 1945, the Owens Valley airports returned to civilian use, primarily focusing on transporting sportsmen and vacationers to the area.  The next chapter of this story is the nearly 40 year aviation business run by Bob and Shirley White. Stay tuned, as we research and share this amazing history, and add to this page!