San Antonio has many excellent colleges and universities, but it's likely none outshines the beautiful U.S. Air Force Academy located at Randolph Air Force Base. It's been more than fifty years since the beautiful Spanish-style campus was--no, wait, that's in an alternate universe. Still, it almost happened in this one, and for more than five years San Antonio was the frontrunner in the competition to host the Academy. Here's how the real story goes.

During World War II a huge number of soldiers and airmen came through San Antonio, many of them training at Lackland, Kelly and Randolph Field (as air bases were called then). So many were here that famed songwriter Cole Porter set his musical "Something for the Boys" outside Kelly Field. And even before the war, Randolph had received the nickname "West Point of the Air" because of its pilot training (a not-very-good movie was made with that name starring Wallace Beery).

So after the war, when Congress created a separate Air Force from the Army Air Corps, local congressman Paul Kilday figured that the new service should have its own academy and that it should be located here. Now, lots of congressmen say lots of things about how their districts deserve government projects, but Kilday had some serious backing. In June of 1948, the new Air Force's Chief of Staff Hoyt Vandenberg was being questioned by congressmen trying to come up with an Air Force budget. Carl Vinson asked Vandenberg if he thought the Air Force would need its own academy, as the Army had at West Point, New York and the Navy had at Annapolis, Maryland. Vandenberg replied yes. The San Antonio Express noted what followed in its June 3, 1948 edition:

"[Congressman Carl] Vinson then asked the chief of staff where the academy could best be located. 'Randolph Field, Texas,' Vandenberg said. Vandenberg pointed out that the climate was one of the foremost considerations not only for flying but because of the economy in constructing buildings and houses in the warm climate of San Antonio."

And Vandenberg wasn't even the first big shot to recommend the city. Previously Secretary for Air Stuart Symington had said the same thing about the proposed academy and its location. The next year the country's first Defense Secretary (it had been Secretary of War before) James Forrestal supported an air academy, saying it was impossible for the two existing academies to produce enough officers for three services. So what happened? Certainly Congressman Kilday never dropped the ball. In the San Antonio Light for March 6, 1949, Kilday said "I still insist that congress should set up the Air Academy at Randolph, and I am not a bit worried." And why should he have been? Kilday's bill to name Randolph now had the backing of the Air Force Secretary, House Speaker Sam Rayburn of Texas, and Senator Lyndon Johnson.

So what happened? Politics, perhaps with a little corruption thrown in. On June 22, 1951, the San Antonio Light headlined "SURPRISE BILL MAY SNARL AF SCHOOL," pointing out that House Armed Services Committee Chairman Carl Vinson had introduced a bill to allow $20 million for the new air academy, but would give the Air Force authority to pick a site. Vinson, either innocent or lying outright, was reported to have said "the air force contemplates establishing the academy at some existing air force installation or at a civilian institution that could be leased at a minimum of expense." That sounded nice to a nation that had just finished paying $200 billion for a war and was in another, but a commission had already chosen seven locations for the new academy, and Randolph was one of just two that met those specifications (the others were near Grapevine and in Grayson County, Texas; Madison, Indiana; Charlotte, North Carolina; Camp Beale, California, and, guess what--Colorado Springs. The next day the San Antonio Express editorialized "Why could not the Air Force solve its problem permanently by locating the academy at Randolph-- that possesses not only the physical plant, but also a 25-year service record as the West Point of the Air? In that event the A.F. would not need all the 10 million dollars for land purchase which the Vinson Bill would appropriate."

But why save money when you've got the taxpayers' cash to throw around? Vinson's bill didn't pass, but three years later one did, and it was obvious the fix was in. Congressman Kilday announced in mid-June of 1954 that he had dropped his push for Randolph "for the welfare of the Air Force and the country." Translation: it was time to move out of the way or get squashed like a bug. Ten days later the Air Force proudly announced that it had decided on Colorado Springs, for its "all-year temperate climate" and other reasons. Yeah, it was temperate, Kilday replied - "for an Eskimo." The news report went on to say the unimproved site was near the North American Air Defense Command, "and a favorite spot for many Air Force generals." Puh-leeze. Even fifty years later, far more current and former Air Force generals live in San Antonio than in pokey, icebound Colorado Springs.

And so went $150 million of government money, to build an Air Force Academy where no man had been stupid enough to go before. In order to justify that location, the Air Force had to give up the idea of training officers to fly at its own academy. Suddenly, flying an airplane was not a key factor in educating Air Force officers. It was as if the Navy had never put midshipmen on boats or West Point had never put cadets on bivouac. And saving money by setting up somewhere already established and proven for Air Force education? How would that look at the Joint Chiefs of Staff barbecues?

At the center of it all was Carl Vinson, who spent more than 50 years in the House of Representatives and was in charge of military spending for almost 20. Vinson did help prepare the country for World War II by ramping up ship building, but he also was the key in making $500 hammers possible for the Department of Defense by backing every bloated spending bill that came his way. We'll never know what Vinson accepted or traded to put the Air Force Academy in Colorado Springs, but his existence for half a century in Congress was a clear argument for term limits. Today, a medical center, institute of government and a nuclear aircraft carrier are named for Vinson. How appropriate, since all of them were paid for with somebody else's money.

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