Tampa in World War II: MacDill Field, Drew Field and the Hookers Point Shipyard

MacDill Field on Tampa's Interbay Peninsula was dedicated on April 16, 1941, and through the war it trained bomber crews on the B-17 Flying Fortress, the B-26 Marauder and, from late 1944, the B-29 Superfortress.

The Air Force dates the base's establishment to 24 May 1939 and the start of construction to 6 September 1939, and names it for Colonel Leslie MacDill, an aviator killed in a 1938 crash (MacDill AFB fact sheet). The state's account adds that the War Department picked Tampa in 1939 for one of several new air fields and that the site, seven miles south of Tampa on the southwestern tip of the Interbay Peninsula, had already served as a staging area in the Spanish American War (Florida Department of State).

Hillsborough County paid for the land. To win the base, the Hillsborough County Commission bought a 3,500 acre parcel and donated it to the federal government, and the field, then called Southeast Air Base, was designated Third Air Force headquarters, with its first troops arriving in March 1940 (Museum of Florida History). As many as 15,000 military personnel were stationed at MacDill at one time, and members of the Women's Army Corps served there from 1943.

The saying One a day in Tampa Bay grew out of B-26 Marauder training at MacDill, and 63 B-26s crashed in Tampa Bay in 1943 (Museum of Florida History). From 1942 to 1945, many thousands of men passed through MacDill to train as bomber pilots or crew members before moving on to the air war over Europe (Florida Veterans History Program).

The two state accounts give different dates for the B-29 era at MacDill: the Museum of Florida History says B-29 crew training began in late 1944, while the Florida Veterans History Program says it began in January 1945 and lasted through 1953. Both are pages of the Florida Department of State.

Drew Field was Tampa's 1928 municipal airport, taken over in the war as a bomber and air warning training base, returned to the City of Tampa in 1946 and replaced by Tampa International Airport in 1950.

The City of Tampa describes the original Drew Field as a 130 acre grass airfield named for cattleman and land developer John H. Drew (City of Tampa). The federal government leased it as a sub post to MacDill, heavy bombers began flying there in May 1940, and once MacDill was finished Drew became a separate base and headquarters of the III Fighter Command (Museum of Florida History).

Drew outgrew its parent field in head count. It covered fifteen square miles, held as many as 25,000 personnel and ran signal air warning and engineering aviation training. Drew Field trained one thousand ten man combat bombing crews during the war (Museum of Florida History). The wartime base had airstrips, barracks and field hospitals, according to the City of Tampa, whose Drew Park page says the neighborhood was originally Drew Field.

Two official dates mark the handover. In the state museum's account the city took the airfield back in 1946 (Museum of Florida History), and Hillsborough County dates the opening of Tampa International Airport, replacing aging Drew Field, to 1950 (Hillsborough County). The road between the two wartime fields survives as Dale Mabry Highway: the City of Tampa says it was built in 1943, and the county says its first segment was completed in the early 1940s and named for Capt. Dale Mabry, an Army airship pilot who died in 1922 (Hillsborough County).

Yes: German prisoners of war from Camp Blanding worked at both Drew Field and MacDill Field in Tampa from 1944, with up to 395 held near Drew and as many as 500 at MacDill.

The camp near Drew Field, three miles from the airfield, held 395 Germans between August 1944 and March 1946, who worked in quartermaster workshops, kitchens, canteens and warehouses (Museum of Florida History). The state museum adds that the Drew camp had internal conflicts because of an unusually strong Nazi spirit among its prisoners.

At MacDill, German prisoners arrived from Camp Blanding in December 1944, reaching a maximum of 500, and did janitorial work, automotive repair, mosquito control, mess and laundry duty (Museum of Florida History). The City of Tampa describes the Drew Field base as holding a German and Italian POW camp (City of Tampa), while both state museum entries for the Tampa fields mention German prisoners and no Italians, so the two accounts are given side by side.

Yes: Port Tampa Bay's history names two Tampa wartime shipyards, the Tampa Shipbuilding Company yard and the McCloskey yard at Hookers Point, and the port later acquired both from the federal government.

Port Tampa Bay's own history says the port was called on to help with shipbuilding during the war, and that on June 11, 1945, as the war was ending, the Florida Legislature created the Hillsborough County Port Authority to run the Port of Tampa (Port Tampa Bay). The first land the new authority obtained was the former McCloskey Shipyards.

The port's timeline records that in 1948 it signed a lease purchase agreement for the former WWII naval shipbuilding facility known as the McCloskey Shipyard or Hooker's Point shipyard, and that in 1964 it acquired 52 acres of the former Tampa Shipbuilding Company shipyard from the federal government and moved its offices into one of the yard buildings (Port Tampa Bay).

For researchers, USF Libraries Special Collections in Tampa holds a Tampa Shipbuilding Company collection with maps of the shipyard buildings from about 1945, ship launch invitations and contract listings (USF Libraries). The same special collections department also holds plans for Henderson Field and the Drew and MacDill base newspapers, according to the Museum of Florida History (Museum of Florida History).

Tampa's war years run from the 1939 choice of the Interbay Peninsula for MacDill to the 1946 return of Drew Field to the city, with the port authority created in June 1945.

Several of these Tampa dates come in pairs. MacDill has a 1939 establishment date from the Air Force and a 1941 dedication date from the state, and Drew Field has a 1946 return date and a 1950 airport opening date. Each pair describes two different steps rather than a disagreement, and the table keeps both.

Two Tampa World War II sites open to visitors are the SS American Victory at 705 Channelside Drive and Hillsborough County's Veterans Memorial Park and Museum on US Highway 301, since MacDill itself is a closed base.

The SS American Victory, moored in Tampa, was launched in June 1945 as one of 414 Victory ships built in the war, and reconditioning to turn it into a memorial to the Merchant Marine and the Navy Armed Guard began in 1999 (Museum of Florida History). The ship museum lists its hours as Monday 12 PM to 5 PM and Tuesday to Sunday 10 AM to 5 PM at 705 Channelside Dr (American Victory Ship). The state museum's directions to the ship end at the Florida Aquarium parking lot, reached from Channelside Drive by York Street (Museum of Florida History).

Veterans Memorial Park and Museum, at 3602 North US Highway 301 near the Tampa Bypass Canal, is open daily from 7 AM to 5 PM (Hillsborough County). It opened on July 4, 1991, and its grounds hold a WWII Submarine Memorial and a WWII Stuart tank dedicated to the 14th Armored Division, with WACS and WAVES uniforms inside (Museum of Florida History).

MacDill is still an active base on 5,695 acres along Tampa Bay (MacDill AFB fact sheet). The Museum of Florida History notes that groups of twenty to forty people may be allowed on by prior arrangement with the MacDill Public Affairs Office, so a visit to the wartime field is a group request rather than a drive up. Last verified: October 18, 2026, against the Museum of Florida History site listings, the MacDill fact sheet, Port Tampa Bay and the Hillsborough County park page.