Abandoned & Little-Known Airfields: North Carolina: Greensboro area

Abandoned & Little-Known Airfields:

North Carolina: Greensboro area

Caswell Airpark (revised 10/25/07) - Clayton Airport / Meadowlark Gliderport (revised 10/25/07)

Huffman Field / Fairchild Field (revised 10/5/06)

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Clayton Airport / Meadowlark Gliderport, Whitsett, NC

36.07 North / 79.58 West (East of Greensboro, NC)

Clayton Airport, as depicted on the 1962 USGS topo map.

Photo of the airport while open has not been located.

The date of construction of this little airfield has not been determined.

The earliest depiction of the field which has been located

was on the 1962 USGS topo map.

It labeled the field as “Clayton”.

Jonathon Payne recalled, “Meadowlark had one 2,000' paved Runway 18/36,

a few tiedowns west of the runway, no facilities, and was privately owned.

One of the more interesting features of this airfield was the incredibly narrow paved runway.

At only 5' wide it barely seemed wide enough to be a sidewalk, let alone a runway.

The reason for this was that the paved part of the runway was for the tow-plane

and the gliders took off & landed from the grass immediately adjacent to the runway.”

Jonathan continued, “But the real attraction at Meadowlark was not the sailplaneing,

but the $100 hamburgers at the Brightwood Inn across the street.

Brightwood’s claim to fame is that in 1955 Elvis Presley stopped by for a meal

before a concert at Williams High School in Burlington.

Even though Elvis wasn’t famous yet,

it was still probably the biggest thing to happen to the tiny town of Whitsett before or since.”

The 1991 USGS topo map depicted a single north/south runway, labeled simply as “Landing Strip”.

The last aeronautical chart depiction which has been located of Meadowlark Gliderport

was on the 2000 NC Aeronautical Chart (courtesy of Jonathan Payne).

It depicted Meadowlark Gliderport as a private field having a single 2,200' paved runway.

Meadowlark Gliderport was evidently closed at some point between 2000-2002,

as it was no longer depicted at all on the 2002 Sectional Chart (according to Jonathan Payne).

According to Jonathon Payne, “Concerning the closure of the gliderport,

the owner died and, not finding a person with the funds who wanted to keep the airport open,

the property was sold to Systems Contractors Inc., a construction subcontractor,

who used the property to house their warehouses & shops.”

A circa 2001-2006 aerial photo depicted the Meadowlark Gliderport as remaining intact,

although a row of trees had been planted perpendicular across the north end of the runway.

A 2006 photo by Jonathan Payne looking south along Meadowlark's former Runway 18.

Jonathon Payne reported in 2006, “Even if someone was found that could have kept it operational,

I doubt that it would have lasted too long as up-scale housing developments

have started cropping up all around the old airport.

The runway still exists, but the grass is slowly starting to overtake it.

Part of the runway is used to store the business’ trailers & CONEX containers.”

A 2006 photo by Jonathan Payne looking north along the remains of Meadowlark's incredibly narrow paved Runway 36: a mere 5' wide..

Meadowlark Gliderport is located southeast of the intersection of Boone Valley Road & Burlington Road.

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Huffman Field / Fairchild Field, Burlington, NC

36.09 North / 79.41 West (West of Raleigh, NC)

What was originally known as "Huffman" Field, as depicted on a 1935 Airway Chart.

Photo of the airfield has not been located.

According to an article from the 9/4/93 issue of the Burlington Times (according to John Jarratt),

the first plane landed at this location in 1919,

and Glenn Huffman & Dover Fogleman built an airfield here in 1931.

Huffman Field was formally dedicated 7/3/33.

The earliest reference to the field which has been located

was in the 1934 Department of Commerce Airfield Directory (courtesy of Chris Kennedy).

It described Huffman Field as a commercial airport with two 1,800' sod runways,

Two hangars were said to be located on the northwest corner of the field.

The earliest depiction of Huffman Field which has been located was on a 1935 Airway Chart.

The Airport Directory Company's 1938 Airports Directory (courtesy of Chris Kennedy)

described Huffman as a commercial airport.

It was said to have two 1,800' sod runways (north/south & northeast/southwest),

and offer "hangars, fuel, and limited repairs".

Huffman Field was depicted as a commercial airfield

on the May 1941 14M Regional Aeronautical Chart (courtesy of Chris Kennedy).

An undated (WW2-era) view of a Fairchild AT-21 Gunner flying over Alamance County.

An undated (WW2-era) view of AT-21s on the assembly line inside the Fairchild Factory in Burlington.

After the outbreak of WW2, the federal government took over the old Burlington Rayon Plant on North Church Street,

and moved Fairchild Aircraft Company into it to begin production of a twin-engine training plane, the Fairchild AT-21 Gunner.

The factory was located directly across the street from Huffman Airport,

which was evidently renamed at that time to Fairchild Field.

The factory was greatly enlarged to support its new role of aircraft production.

Improvements were also made at the nearby Huffman Airport (including new hangars & a concrete runway),

which Fairchild used as a testing ground.

The AT-21 had fairly unusual construction, being built from plastified wood.

It looked rather like a small bomber,

with a single machine gun in the glazed nose & a top turret with twin machine guns.

The AT-21 was a specialized bomber crew trainer,

intended to train crews in the use of power gun turrets or a gun on a flexible mount,

as well as learn to function as a member of a crew.

The AT-21 had a brief production run & an extremely brief service life.

The first AT-21 was completed at Burlington in 1943,

but production ran for only one year, by which point the plant had turned out more than a hundred aircraft.

Use of the AT-21 also ended in 1944,

when they were replaced by training examples of the actual aircraft in which the gunners would eventually serve.

After production of the AT-21 was completed, Fairchild vacated the facility,

and the Firestone company moved in to produce guns as a part of the war effort.

The war years brought tremendous growth to the area.

Many new people moved in to work at Fairchild

and a completely new community went up on the side of the property

where Eastlawn Elementary School & the City Schools Administration building are located today.

A community of barracks-like buildings were constructed to house the workers at Fairchild

and the area became Fairchild Heights.

Fairchild Field was depicted as an auxiliary airfield

on the March 1945 Winston Salem Sectional Chart (courtesy of Chris Kennedy).

After WW2 ended, the Western Electric Company took over the plant,

which was still a government-owned facility.

In the 1950s & 60s, Western Electric manufactured large portions

of the Nike Ajax & Hercules surface-to-air missile system at the Burlington plant.

The airport itself apparently continued in operation after WW2 as a civil airport,

as Fairchild Field was depicted on the 1948 Winton-Salem Sectional Chart (according to Chris Kennedy).

The 1960 Jeppesen Airway Manual (courtesy of Chris Kennedy)

depicted Fairchild Field as having a single 3,500 paved Runway 2/20,

with a taxiway leading to a ramp on the west side of the field with a few small buildings (hangars?).

The 1962 AOPA Airport Directory described Fairchild Field as having a single 3,500' asphalt Runway 4/22,

and listed the operator as Alamance Aviation Service, Inc.

Fairchild Field was depicted on the March 1966 Winston-Salem Sectional Chart (courtesy of Chris Kennedy)

as having a single 3,500' paved runway.

George Wallace held a rally at Huffman Field during his campaign for president in 1968, according to Eddie Huffman.

Eddie recalled, “I grew up in the neighborhood,

and my father worked for four decades at the Western Electric (later AT&T) plant, located in the former Fairchild Aircraft plant.

I have vague recollections of planes still taking off and landing there in the late 1960s or early 1970s.

When I was growing up in the 1970s, the runway was still clearly visible along Graham-Hopedale Road.”

In the 1970s the Burlington plant was geared for new growth with plans for production of the Safeguard system,

an anti-ballistic missile defense system,

but treaties with the Soviet Union ended this program before it had a chance to begin.

That resulted in severe cutbacks in production & employment at the Burlington plant.

The date of closure of Fairchild Field is unknown.

It was apparently closed at some point between 1966-72,

as it was no longer depicted at all (even as an abandoned airfield)

on the August 1972 Charlotte Sectional Chart (courtesy of Robert Brown).

After the breakup of the Bell system in the 1980s,

the Burlington plant became an AT&T facility.

Jonathon Payne recalled, “My father grew up in the area & worked at the AT&T building in the late 1980s.

At the time part of the building was used as a monitoring station for the Navy’s SOSUS sonar net in the North Atlantic.

My father was a UNIX programmer for the station’s mainframe.

When Western Electric won the contract, it had to put the receiving station somewhere

and the old Fairchild plant was still government-owned & available

(the SOSUS signals were sent by satellite, so the receiver station wasn't dependent on a specific geographical location).”

Eddie Huffman recalled, “Hobbyists routinely flew radio-controlled airplanes at the old Huffman Field

into the 1980s and possibly early 1990s until a pair of mobile home dealerships covered most of the remaining runway.”

The Burlington plant continued to operate as an AT&T facility

until AT&T moved to the Rock Creek Industrial Park in 1992.

A circa 2000 USGS aerial view of the site of the former Fairchild Field

(both the original photo, and a version with the runway alignment superimposed by John Hunter).

The former Fairchild aircraft factory at the northwest corner of the photo.

According to John Hunter,

"The remains of the runway are still visible if one knows what to look for.

A Lowe's lumber store was built on the site as well as other commercial construction."

"The Lowe's has moved on & there is other stuff there now -

the lumber yard used to be at the south end of the strip 20 years ago.

The large white-roofed building top center (just north of US 70) is the old Fairchild plant.

If you look at the vacant lot to the east of the plant you will see a small diagonal trail going southeast to US70.

This is where the taxiway used to be.

The taxiway terminated on the south side of US70 on the west side of the runway.

The runway alignment was at a right angle to US 70

and ran south along the large forest of trees grown up on the east side.

I believe that personal inspection would yield some original runway pavement still remaining."

Eddie Huffman reported in 2005, “Most of the asphalt runway remained visible until 2004.

Wal-Mart has recently begun construction of a new store at the site,

obliterating almost all that remained of the old runway.

The only section of the runway still relatively intact & visible

lies between Mebane Street & North Church Street, a block-sized strip just east of the state alcohol store on Mebane.”

The Minor League baseball park just west of the former south end of the runway is still known as "Fairchild Field".

Two 2006 photos by Scott Murdock of the former Fairchild factory.

A 2006 photo by Jonathon Payne “of the last remaining segment of runway from the old Fairchild Field.”

Jonathon Payne reported in 2006, “The new Wal-Mart was recently competed, obliterating most traces of the old runway.

There is still a piece of the old runway on the north side of Mebane Street.

There are a few parts still visible at the mobile home retailers,

just south of the Wal-Mart, if one knows what to look for.”

The site of Fairchild Field is located at intersection of Route 70 & North Graham Hopedale Road.