Qualla: Marine Corps Air Station Cherry Point

Marine Corps Air Station Cherry Point: Introduction

Sat, 30 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Cpl. John Neff, Public domain. Construction crews broke ground on the eastern North Carolina swamp in November 1941, seventeen days before Japanese planes appeared over Pearl Harbor. By the time the bombs fell on Battleship Row, bulldozers were already draining cypress sloughs along the Neuse River, malaria control crews were dosing the standing water, and 8,000 acres of farms and timberland were being reshaped into what would become the largest Marine Corps air station in the world. The Marines named it Cunningham Field on May 20, 1942, honoring Lieutenant Colonel Alfred A. Cunningham, the Corps' first aviator. The local post office, tucked among the cherry trees that gave the area its name, eventually rebranded the base in its own image.

Image: Cpl. John Neff | Public domain

Marine Corps Air Station Cherry Point: Born of Swamp and Urgency

Sat, 30 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit U.S. Department of Defense Current Photos, Public domain. Congress authorized the station on July 9, 1941, appropriating $14,990,000 to clear an 8,000-acre tract along Slocum Creek. Clearing began on August 6 with extensive drainage work and malaria control - the coastal lowlands were no place for an airfield without first taming the wa...

Image: U.S. Department of Defense Current Photos | Public domain

Marine Corps Air Station Cherry Point: The Sound of Three Wars

Sat, 30 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit U.S. Department of Defense Current Photos, Public domain. Cherry Point's Korean War contribution was a steady current of trained aviators and air crewmen flowing west to forward units. During Vietnam, three A-6 Intruder squadrons deployed to the Far East from these runways, the slab-sided attack jets streaking out across the rice paddie...

Image: U.S. Department of Defense Current Photos | Public domain

Marine Corps Air Station Cherry Point: The New Generation Arrives

Sat, 30 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Marine Corps, Public domain. In 2024, VMFA-251 received its first F-35C Lightning II, becoming the first active-duty F-35C squadron based on the East Coast. The fifth-generation fighter, carrier-capable and stealthy, represents the future of Marine fixed-wing aviation. It joins a lineup at Cherry Point that ...

Image: Marine Corps | Public domain

Marine Corps Air Station Cherry Point: Cold War Radar on the Neuse

Sat, 30 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit US Navy, Public domain. For six years Cherry Point also pulled Air Force duty. On July 1, 1957, the USAF 614th Airborne Control and Warning Squadron set up shop with AN/FPS-6 and AN/FPS-8 radars mounted on ninety-foot towers, scanning the Atlantic approaches for Soviet bombers. The site became part of t...

Image: US Navy | Public domain

Marine Corps Air Station Cherry Point: Approach from the Neuse

Sat, 30 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit U.S. Department of Defense Current Photos Cpl. Todd Michalek/24th Marine Expeditionary Unit, Public domain. Cherry Point sits on a peninsula where the Neuse River widens toward Pamlico Sound, the runways oriented to catch the prevailing winds off the Atlantic. From altitude the airfield reads as a great triangle of concrete set in pine forest and tidal marsh, with Slocum Creek curling ...

Image: U.S. Department of Defense Current Photos Cpl. Todd Michalek/24th Marine Expeditionary Unit | Public domain