Lee Gilmer Memorial Airport is a city owned public use airport located in Gainesville, a city in Hall County, Georgia, United States.HistoryIn 1941 only a dirt airstrip existed. At this time a request by the City of Gainesville was placed with the Civil Aeronautics Administration of the United States for a municipal Airport.In 1943 the US Navy leased the airport land from the City of Gainesville for one dollar to be used by the military during World War II. At that time the Navy had sufficient land to permit development of the intersecting 4000-foot paved runways with parallel taxiways, aircraft and electronics maintenance facilities, barracks and related support facilities.The base functioned as a satellite of the Naval Air Station at what is now Dekalb-Peachtree Airport. The mission of the Gainesville facility was to train ground personnel in ground controlled approach (GCA) procedures.Truck-mounted radar was used to track approaching target aircraft. Some of the equipment that was in use at the time can be seen in the black and white photographs in the main terminal building. Some of the buildings that were used can be identified as the terminal and control tower (tower not used since World War II), large radar maintenance hangar, Navy brig, and an aircraft maintenance hangar that still exists today.
