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History of Ft. Carson part II
Fort Carson History
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Please check out the part 1 post if you haven’t read: An early history of Ft. Carson
Part II starts in the early 1960’s and will go through 2004. I’ll deal with Ft. Carson today in another article that will also give some great websites if you’re being transferred here in the near future.
look for the statue of Kit Carson also located by the main gate
During the early 1960’s, Ft. Carson was home to only one major unit and was on McNamara’s list of potential base closings. This was not known at the time but the Cuban Missile Crisis and Berlin blockade was enough for the Army to reactivate two more divisions, including the 5th Infantry which formally reactivated in early 1962. The 5th was the Army’s first mechanized Infantry division to be organized. The problem was the need for land. Tanks need lots of room to roam and so in 1965, the base acquired almost 25,000 acres of state land (remember it was originally leased in 1942). They traded the land with some federal land owned at the time close to Lowry near Denver. Also, in 1965 and 1966 they purchased almost 79,000 acres south of the original base for around $3.5 million. All this brought Ft. Carson up to its current size of 138,523 acres, though Ft. Carson officials and the Army have recently been trying to acquire more land which has been met Read the rest of this entry »
An early history of Ft. Carson
Part one of the early history of Ft. Carson
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The history of Ft Carson started when Japan attacked Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941; and the United States declared war on Japan which soon included all the Axis Powers. Officials in charge of selecting new sites for military installations went into immediate action, as they would soon have many new troops to train. Less than one month later it was announced that Colorado Springs had been selected as the site for an army camp. On February 22, 1942, Colorado Springs newspapers reported that the installation would be named Camp Carson in honor of Brigadier General Christopher “Kit” Carson, the famous frontiersman. The original military reservation consisted of 60,048 acres of land; some donated by the city of Colorado Springs, some purchased from private owners or acquired from the Department of Interior. The Army even leased some from the State of Colorado.
During World War II, a total of 104,165 soldiers trained at Camp Carson. More than 125 units were activated at Camp Carson and other units were transferred to the Mountain Post from other installations. The camp trained nurses, cooks, mule packers, tank battalions, and many other types of personnel. Toward the end of the war, after the departure of the divisions and established units, Camp Carson trained replacement troops as well. In late 1943, approximately 43,000 military personnel came here and were quickly trained so they could be sent overseas to do their part for the war. There were no facilities for dependents, so if a Read the rest of this entry »
