DUANE
Duane's take
The official marker's the source, and here's how I tell it. Now, they called it 'Little Adobe' — and if you've ever seen a pueblo revival building rise up out of the flat Texas plains around Wichita Falls, you understand why that name stuck. This wasn't just any building.
When it went up in 1928, it was built to serve as the air terminal for Kell Field — the first municipal airport for the city of Wichita Falls. The first. In a time when airports were still something people drove out to just to watch.
Then 1941 rolls around, and the whole operation gets swept up into something much bigger. Kell Field was incorporated into Sheppard Field, a World War II Army Air Corps Training Center. The little pueblo building that once greeted the curious and the daring was now part of the machinery of war.
These days it sits inside Sheppard Air Force Base, still standing, still carrying its history. And here's where the story earns its keep — because the pilots who passed through that terminal weren't just anybody. Charles Lindbergh.
Wiley Post. Amelia Earhart. Those three names together on a short list have a weight to them that a building doesn't need to say out loud.
It just stands there, adobe-colored and unhurried, while the jets scream overhead — and it has already seen everything.
What the marker says
Known as "Little Adobe", this pueblo revival building was constructed in 1928 to serve as the air terminal for Kell Field, the first municipal airport for the city of Wichita Falls. In 1941 it was incorporated into Sheppard Field, a World War II Army Air Corps Training Center. Now part of Sheppard Air Force Base, the Kell Field Air Terminal has served such notable pilots as Charles Lindbergh, Wiley Post, and Amelia Earhart. (Recorded Texas Historic Landmark - 1981.)