Wednesday, October 2, 2013

Thunderbirds


The above photo shows the entrance to the Thunderbird School of Global Management, a top ranked international business school who's MBA graduates work in positions all over the world.  It's located in Glendale Arizona and was founded in 1946 by U.S. Army Air Force Lieutenant General Barton Kyle Yount.

The property on which the school is located has an interesting history before the school began.  In 1941 and executive order sought construction of 50,000 PT-17 airplanes and to train 100,000 pilots for war duty.  The civil aviation community answered the call to train the pilots and this one square mile of desert became know as Thunderbird Field.  Operations began that year and ended in 1945 at the end of the war.  The civilian pilots trained 16,000 cadets from the U.S., Britain and China.

The PT-17 was a bi-plane like the one on this memorial to the pilots.  You can see a picture of one here.



I have a new photo on Sharon's Sojourns.  This time I visit a city in Italy that has few tourists.
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13 comments:

  1. AnonymousOctober 2, 2013 at 1:35 AM

    Very interesting place, great looking memorial too.

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  2. PerthDailyPhotoOctober 2, 2013 at 1:54 AM

    I love that they kept the name Sharon..The ochre coloured buildings in Arizona are so photogenically suited to the brilliant blue skies.

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  3. UnknownOctober 2, 2013 at 3:30 AM

    The architecture looks very cool.

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  4. BirdmanOctober 2, 2013 at 5:44 AM

    I guess this isn't the cheap, Bowery wine factory. You had my hopes up. hehehehehehe!

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  5. LowellOctober 2, 2013 at 6:36 AM

    A cool bit of history. Is this near Luke AFB? And what an entrance! It's interesting to see how aviation technology changed in those few years.

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  6. Dave-CostaRicaDailyPhoto.comOctober 2, 2013 at 7:18 AM

    I did not know that history. Thank you.

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  7. KateOctober 2, 2013 at 9:18 AM

    In the early '60's while visiting Phoenix Jim and I met some Luftwaffe pilots that were being trained there. I wonder if this is the airbase where they were located?

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  8. KarlOctober 2, 2013 at 9:18 AM

    Interesting place and history.
    Orange and blue make a good combination.

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  9. RedPatOctober 2, 2013 at 10:02 AM

    Love the shots and the interesting history, Sharon!

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  10. JudyOctober 2, 2013 at 1:53 PM

    That is interesting!

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  11. JackOctober 2, 2013 at 6:22 PM

    I have heard of Thunderbird, of course, and I wondered where it got the name. Interesting.

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  12. RandyOctober 2, 2013 at 7:46 PM

    There used to be the best pizza place on the corner of 59th Ave and Greenway.

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  13. Steve ReedOctober 3, 2013 at 11:51 PM

    What strikes me, as a Londoner, about this photo is that incredible SKY! But I'm sure it's pretty typical for Arizona.

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