NAS Key West sends wings over the Keys
A Naval Air Station is built at Key West’s Trumbo Point
The skies above Key West opened a new chapter in 1917. That same year, the Navy acquired Trumbo Point, a man-made peninsula built in 1912 by the Florida East Coast Railway as the terminus of its Overseas Railroad. Ground-breaking for a small coastal air patrol station was on July 13, 1917, and the base was commissioned on December 18, 1917.
The Navy quickly transformed Trumbo Point into the seaplane base for Key West’s first naval aviation station, complete with ramps, a dirigible hangar, and a hydrogen plant for blimps. Submarines joined the mix, and aviators trained in the steady weather of the Keys. Though no enemy subs were found, these patrols marked the birth of U.S. Navy anti-submarine warfare. Nearly 500 aviators earned their wings here, but with the war’s end, most facilities were dismantled, leaving only a radio station and a scaled-back naval presence.
At left: A huge navy dirigible is returned to its hangar circa 1918, NAS Key West. Photo courtesy Monroe County Public Library.
Shifting shores: Trumbo Point and beyond
With the approach of World War II, the Navy reopened and expanded its aviation facilities. In December 1940 the station was formally reactivated, and by 1942 the Navy had taken over what became known as Boca Chica Field, constructing paved runways and establishing a full airfield there. From that time forward, Boca Chica became the beating heart of NAS Key West’s aviation operations.
Trumbo Point, once the bustling seaplane hub of naval aviation, gradually lost its primary airfield role after World War II. Through late 20th-century realignments, much of its waterfront and older infrastructure—along with parts of the Truman Annex—were slated for disposal or repurposing. Today, Trumbo Point remains part of NAS Key West, but in a very different capacity: serving as military housing, bachelor officers’ quarters, and Coast Guard operations.