Original Items: One-of-a-kind set. This is a great piece of U.S. WWII Aviation History! The Army Air Force Flexible Gunnery School, Kingman, Arizona, was built at the start of World War II as an aerial gunnery training base, located on approximately 4,145 acres in Mohave County next to U.S. Route 66. Arizona was an ideal location due to its sparse low population and miles of wide open spaces.

It offered its first classes in January of 1943, and was renamed Kingman Army Air Field (KAAF) later that year with the primary mission of training gunners for the B-17 Flying Fortress.

The air field became one of the Army Air Corps' largest, training 35,000 individuals. Its facilities included housing for 3,200 enlisted men, 3,070 cadets and 430 officers. "Bugs Bunny" became the base's official mascot (see photo of sign above) because of the large number of rabbits that inhabited in the area. The base newspaper was known as the "Cactus". With the end of the war, additional training bases were not needed, and Kingman was ordered to close.

After the war the Reconstruction Finance Corporation established five large storage, sales and scrapping centers for Army Air Forces aircraft. These were located at Albuquerque AAF, New Mexico, Altus AAF, Oklahoma, Kingman, Arizona, Ontario AAF, California and Walnut Ridge AAF, Arkansas. A sixth facility for storing, selling and scrapping Navy and Marine aircraft was located at Clinton, Oklahoma.

The facility at Kingman housed many aircraft until 1949, when the last were scrapped or sold off, and the facility was returned to civilian ownership. However numerous parts and artifacts were left behind during the fast liquidation process, and that is the origin of this original Fuel Cap.

In the center top is the following caption:

I certify that the item described above originated from Kingman Army Air Field and that, to my knowledge, it was removed from one of the thousands of U.S. Army Air Force planes stored there after World War Two.

A great many of those aircraft were combat veterans that returned to the States from bases in the European & Pacific Theaters and, even though the planes are long gone, this piece of history is still here to remind us of them, the many who worked on them and those who trained, lived, fought, and sometimes perished in them.

Surrounding this statement are pictures of various aircraft in storage at Kingman Army Airfield, and below is the insignia of the Air Field and Training center. It is signed and dated by John C. Szabo, who was the person who recovered and mounted this piece.

All of this is very nicely mounted under a sheet of glass in a wooden frame. It measures about 13" W x 1/4" x 17" H x 1 1/2", and is in wonderful display condition. A great piece of WWII Memorabilia, and a reminder of the many airplanes that served during the war, only to await their fate in the "Boneyard" at Kingman Army Airfield.