The chain of WWII naval air stations that built the Pacific Fleet
In 1941 Florida had three civilian airports of consequence. By 1945 it had thirty Navy bases. Every airport on the Pirep Florida map with "1942" in its history is a piece of the same machine. Pensacola trained the pilots. Fort Pierce trained the frogmen — the UDT teams that became today's Navy SEALs ran their first obstacle course on these beaches. Stuart, Melbourne, Sanford, Marathon, Daytona, Banana River — each a naval auxiliary, each a piece of the Pacific war effort. Sanford's RA-5C Vigilantes photographed Cuban missile sites in 1962. Fort Pierce's UDT veterans recovered Apollo astronauts at splashdown. The bases are mostly civilian now — towers replaced by FBO ramps — but the ramp lines and runway widths still tell the story. You could fly a B-25 off any of them. They were built that way.