On this day in New York · October 15, 1939
New York Finally Gets Its Own Airport
Sick of watching his city's planes land in New Jersey, Mayor Fiorello LaGuardia built a $23 million airport in Queens, and 325,000 people showed up in Queens to watch him dedicate it.
The facts
- Dedicated
- October 15, 1939, as the New York Municipal Airport, before an estimated 325,000 spectators
- Construction
- Backed by the Works Progress Administration, work began in 1937 and cost the city $23 million
- Airlines at opening
- Pan American, American, United, Eastern, and Transcontinental & Western Air
- Official renaming
- Became "LaGuardia Airport" on June 1, 1947, when the Port of New York Authority took over the lease
On October 15, 1939, Mayor Fiorello LaGuardia stood before an estimated 325,000 spectators in Queens to dedicate the New York Municipal Airport, a $23 million rebuild of the old North Beach Airport, itself built on the ruins of the Steinway family's Gala Amusement Park. Five airlines, Pan American, American, United, Eastern, and Transcontinental & Western Air, had already signed on to fly out of the new 550-acre field. Overhead, skywriters spelled out what the crowd already wanted to call it: LaGuardia Airport. Scheduled passenger service wouldn't start until December 2, but October 15 was the day the city got to claim, finally, that it had a major airport of its own.
In their words
The day in the words of the people who were there. Every quote is verbatim, and every source links out so you can check it.
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the humiliating position of seeing all its passengers and mail traffic go to a nearby state.
Fiorello LaGuardia, on why New York needed an airport of its own
Source: Wikipedia -
Name it LaGuardia Airport!
The message three skywriters traced over the dedication crowd on October 15, 1939
Source: The Port Authority of NY & NJ
Why it still matters
New York Municipal Airport meant the country's biggest city no longer had to send its flights across the river to Newark. LaGuardia pushed it through as a New Deal jobs project, and the city has been fighting about the airport that ended up with his name on it ever since.
Sources
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