McChord AFB, WA

McChord AFB is a census-designated place in Pierce County, Washington, on the south side of the Tacoma-area military landscape and now associated with Joint Base Lewis-McChord. The airfield grew from a 1920s local campaign to give nearby Fort Lewis its own aviation field. McChord Field became an important Northwest staging and patrol point during World War II; immediately after the attack on Pearl Harbor, crews from the 17th Bombardment Group began coastal patrols over Washington and Oregon. The field later carried the McChord name and developed into an Air Force airlift installation.

The community’s map is shaped by runways, forested training land, and its relationship with Fort Lewis across the joint base. McChord’s airlift mission connected the South Puget Sound region to military operations far beyond Washington, while the combined installation brought Army and Air Force functions into one large working landscape. The local scoop is that McChord AFB is not a separate city in the usual sense: it is the census label for the developed base community around an airfield whose story starts with local boosters, wartime coastal patrols, and the old Fort Lewis connection.