| Bernard's Airport | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| 1938 picture of the airport | |||
| IATA: none – ICAO: none | |||
| Summary | |||
| Airport type | Private | ||
| Location | Beaverton, Oregon | ||
| Coordinates | |||
| Map | |||
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Bernard's Airport
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Bernard's Airport was a non-commercial airfield in Beaverton, Oregon, USA.[1] The airfield was originally named Watts Airport.
The site of Bernard's Airport was originally developed as a motion picture studio in the 1920s. After film making on the West Coast became concentrated in Hollywood this 32-acre (130,000 m2) film studio site was converted into an aircraft hangar factory. Dr. G. E. Watts, the financier behind the film venture in Beaverton, was also an aviation enthusiast, who founded Watts Airport. The original hangar at Watts Airport was on the west side of Erickson, along what is now Sixth Street. Before long, airplanes were being built and tested in Beaverton and many pilots were using the Watts airstrip.
Air Space Magazine, which is affiliated with the Smithsonian, states that the real history of grassroots aviation in Oregon began in "the hayfields of Beaverton" (i.e. Bernard's Airport), where aircraft innovation design achieved a wide circle of inventors and pilots.[2]
Certain experimental and one-of-a-kind aircraft were based at Watts Airport. For example, Alley reports on one unusual plane based at Watts Airport in 1929, that was an experimental one-of-a-kind model.[3] In this aircraft the pilot sat in an open air compartment, behind a roomy enclosed passenger cabin; the aircraft, nicknamed the "Flying Pickle" is now in the Pearson Air Museum.
Having outgrown the site, Charles Bernard was approached[4] to assist with expansion of the airport. Bernard built additional wood frame hangars along an alignment parallel to the what is now Cedar Hills Boulevard. The wooden hangars were designed by George Edward Moshofsky, a Beaverton builder whose home was across the street from the airstrip. The unusual design, which accommodated the aircraft wings, was later depicted in a mural at the Salem Airport. The home-built airplane industry in Beaverton thrived. Bernard Airport was once known as the oldest continuously-operated airport in Oregon. On September 11, 1938 the Oregonian reported that Bernard Airport was "perhaps the busiest non-commercial airport in the United States."[5] In the case of Bernard's Airport there exists the added distinction that most of the planes are amateur built."[5] The airfield was converted into the Beaverton Mall shopping center in 1969.[4]