Nielson Field.svg) | |
|---|---|
| Part ofFifth Air Force | |
| Makati,Philippines | |
 Aerial view of Nielson Airport in 1937 | |
| Site information | |
| Type | Military airfield |
| Controlled by | United States Army Air Forces |
| Location | |
.svg)  Nielson Field Nielson Field, Philippines | |
| Coordinates | 14°33′02.06″N121°01′46.08″E / 14.5505722°N 121.0294667°E /14.5505722; 121.0294667 |
| Site history | |
| Built | 1937 |
| In use | 1937–1948 |
Nielson Field (Luzon, thePhilippines) was the location of theFar East Air Force headquarters of theUnited States Army in thePhilippines. Most of the aircraft of the FEAF were based at eitherClark Field orNichols Field. The cultural site was anHonourable Mention in the 2001UNESCO Asia Pacific Heritage Awards.[1]
Laurie Reuben Nielson was one of the many foreigners attracted by the business opportunities in the Philippines and moved to the country beforeWorld War II. Born inNew Zealand, Nielson and his American wife, Annette, arrived in Manila in the early-to-mid-1930s. He established himself in local business, setting up his own firm, L. R. Nielson & Company, and making inroads in the securities and stock brokerage business, importing, and mining. Nielson also sat on the board ofThe Hongkong and Shanghai Banking Corporation branch in Manila.
Nielson was an avid aviation enthusiast; with this, he became involved in a project to build an aviation school and airport in Manila. It was an ideal time for pursuing the project because there was a real need for an airport to support the increased economic activity in the country, especially in the mining industry, at the same time, theQuezon government was encouraging infrastructure projects. Nielson convinced several other Manila-based foreign investors to join him in the project and construction of the airport proceeded after the group leased 42 hectares (100 acres) of land in Makati fromAyala y Compañía. When it was inaugurated in July 1937, the Nielson Airport was being touted as the biggest and best-equipped in Asia.
After the outbreak of the war and theinvasion of Manila by Japanese forces in 1942, Nielson and his family were detained by the Japanese authorities. Nielson's wife and two sons were brought to the internment camp at theUniversity of Santo Tomas. Nielson, because he wasBritish, was taken for internment inBritish Hong Kong (present-dayHong Kong). Nielson was never seen or heard from again.
By the time the Philippines was liberated from the Japanese, Nielson's businesses and most of his properties were all gone. After his wife and two sons left the Philippines and returned to the United States for good, Nielson's only remaining legacy to the Philippines was the airport he had built.
The property on which the airport stood was part of the HaciendaSan Pedro de Macati owned by theZóbel de Ayala family, then in the province ofRizal. The hacienda encompassed most of what is now the city ofMakati. WhenEnrique Zóbel de Ayala, then senior managing partner at Ayala y Compañía (present-dayAyala Corporation) and a special aide to PresidentManuel L. Quezon, found out about the Nielson group's proposal to the government to build an airport on a turnkey basis, he immediately offered a portion of the hacienda as a possible site for the facility. It was an ideal location for the airport because Makati was then just a sparsely populated town adjacent to Manila. The site was located on a hard tract of land jutting from rice fields, clearly visible from the air, allowing clear approaches from all sides.
The Nielson Airport became the base of the American Far Eastern School of Aviation. More importantly, with the introduction of commercial air services at the airport, it became the primary gateway between Manila and the rest of the country and, later, between the Philippines and the world. ThePhilippine Aerial Taxi Company (PATCO), the first airline company in the Philippines, and theIloilo-Negros Air Express Company, the first Filipino-owned commercial passenger airline, started operating from the Nielson Airport. WhenPhilippine Air Lines was established, its very first flight took off in March 1941 from the Nielson Airport forBaguio.
As a response to the expansionist policy ofJapan, authorities in the Philippines set up theFar East Air Force (FEAF) headquarters at the Nielson Airport. Commercial flights at the airport were halted in October 1941 and the private carriers were asked to relocate their services to make room for theU.S. Army Air Forces.
When Japanese planes attacked the Philippines on December 8, 1941, the planes were actually spotted by aradar station in Northern Luzon, which immediately alerted the FEAF headquarters at Nielson. Unfortunately, by the time FEAF officers were finally able to get through toClark Air Base inPampanga, it was already too late and Japanese bombs were already dropping on Clark. By December 9, Nielson Airport was also under siege. After the Americans and Filipinos were forced to retreat from the Philippines and the Japanese occupation forces took over, the latter sequestered Nielson and turned the airport'sradio tower andpassenger terminal into a headquarters. They also modernized the runways by enlarging and improving them. Originally, the black-topped runways were NE/SW 2,850ft x 99ft and NW/SE 2,850ft x 99ft each on a grassy strip 199ft wide, which the Japanese enlarged to 3,960ft x 328ft. NW/SE and 50 percent of the NE/SW runway were paved with concrete. Other notable improvements included a wide taxiway which encircled the field,revetments, and barracks for 600 men. This airport served as a depot for Japanese planes staging south and it was once reported to have had as many as 300 aircraft at one time. All types of aircraft used the runways and the daily aircraft average was given as ninety. On the morning of 21 September 1944, this airport and three other Japanese air bases in Greater Manila were attacked by American carrier aircraft. This causedPresident Laurel to issue declarations ofmartial law and of war. When Manila was liberated, the Americans and the Filipinos were again able to wrest control of the airport from the Japanese, and the American army's Philippine Civil Affairs Unit established a supply depot at the airport. The partially damaged airport, which was renamed Makati Airport, and its facilities were fully restored and commercial air services, including international flights, resumed in 1946.
In 1948, when the airport ceased operations in Makati to relocate to itspresent site adjacent toNichols Field (nowVillamor Air Base) inPasay, ownership of the airport's permanent facilities reverted to the owner of the land, Ayala y Compañía. Although the runways were eventually converted into roads – the secondary runway (runway 07/25) becamePaseo de Roxas and the primary runway (runway 12/30) becameAyala Avenue – and other airport structures were sacrificed to give way to the development of theMakati business and commercial district, the owners preserved the airport's passenger terminal and control tower, which came to be known as the Nielson Tower.
In the succeeding years, various uses were found for the Nielson Tower, a two-story concrete structure designed to resemble an airplane from a bird's-eye view. At one point, it served as the headquarters of a police detachment. It also housed the offices of the Ayala-owned Integrated Property Management Corporation for several years.
From the late 1970s up to April 1994, a group of Filipino investors leased the tower for a semi-private, first-class club and restaurant, as it is oppositeThe Peninsula Manila hotel. In 1996, after almost two years of renovation work, the Nielson Tower became the home of theFilipinas Heritage Library before its transfer to theAyala Museum. In 2014, Nielson Tower became the home of an upscale restaurant and bar called Blackbird, which uses the former controlroom as its upper dining floor.
This article incorporatespublic domain material from the Air Force Historical Research Agency
Previously: Philippine Department Air Force (1941); Far East Air Force (1941-1942) | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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