The Air Force Missile Development Center and its predecessors were Cold War units that conducted and supported numerous missile tests using facilities at Holloman Air Force Base, where the center was the host unit
The 359th Base Headquarters was the base operating unit for Alamorgordo AAB beginning on 10 June 1942, and the base was redesignated Alamogordo Army Air Field on 21 November 1942 and supported numerous WWII Bomber Groups In October 1944 at Wendover Army Air Base, Utah, the Special Weapons Field Test Unit was established as a detachment of the Special Weapons Branch in Ohio to evaluate captured and experimental systems such as the Republic‐Ford JB‐2, a copy of the German V-1 flying bomb. South of Alamogordo AAF between White Sands National Monument and Fort Bliss, water well drilling began construction of White Sands Proving Ground facilities on 25 June 1945. On 25 March 1944, the 231st AAF BU became the base operating unit, and in 1946 the post-war Alamogordo AAF was "manned by a skeleton crew merely as a plane refueling station, emergency landings, etc" In March 1947, the 1st Experimental Guided Missiles Group of Florida began Republic-Ford JB-2 testing at the Alamogordo range, and the Special Weapons Field Test Unit was inactivated when Wendover transferred to Strategic Air Command. Equipment and 1,200 personnel of the Test Unit moved to a new Alamogordo AAF unit organized 16 March 1947, and the move continued until September 1947 for R&D of pilotless aircraft, guided missiles, and other programs. The Balloon Branch at Alamogordo AAF began in 1947 after an Air Materiel Command awarded a contract to New York University to develop and fly high-altitude balloons. The 4145th was redesignated an Air Force Base Unit on 27 September 1947 during the month the USAF was created, and in late 1947 the former USAAF bombing range and the White Sands Proving Ground merged to become the New Mexico Joint Guided Missile Test Range. The former USAAF air base was designated Holloman Air Force Base on 14 January 1948, and the 2754th Air Force Base was its host unit after being established from the 4145th AFBU on 15 August 1948.
Alamogordo Guided Missile Test Base
The Alamogordo Guided Missile Test Base near Holloman AFB continued to be used for testing in 1948 and later, sub-base of the AFMTC in Florida, and the 2754th subsequently developed additional launch support sites at/near the former bombing range. In March 1949, the 2754th took "control of support airfield, Condron Field...from Biggs Army Air Field at Fort Bliss." The 2754th and subsequent units' launches at the test base and other sites such as for the Tiny Tim, GAM-63 RASCAL, and XQ-2 Drone, e.g.:
1947 June 5: A "cluster of rubber-type balloons" for research was launched near Alamogordo.
1947 July 3: A balloon was launched from " by a New York University team.
1947 November 14: The Alamogordo Guided Missile Test Base had its 1st Boeing GAPA missile launch
1948 July: USAF Project MX–774 commenced with the first RTV-A-2 Hiroc launch
1949 June 14: Holloman prepared the 2nd monkey capsule for the Albert Project
1949: Tactical Air Command began testing the B-61 at Holloman—the initial flight crashed and the 2nd launch outran the chase aircraft--there were 25 total Matador launches at Holloman
1949: The 1st X–8 Aerobee was launched at Holloman.
1952: A "covered wagon launcher" was used for Project Moby Dick balloon launches at Holloman.
1952 : The Holloman range of more than was 2nd in area to the Eglin range
1952: Falcon model "C" and "D" missiles were fired against bomber drones by the March 31 cadre assigned to Holloman AFB from Patrick AFB's 6556th Guided Missile Squadron.
1954 March 19: a new 3,500 ft rocket-powered sled was first run
1955 Spring: Rocket sled Sonic Wind Number 2 was received
1956: Ground firings of AIR-2 Genie missiles identified fin instabilities.
1956 September 1: The 500th Holloman balloon launch was conducted.
1957 February: Test and evaluation of the XSM-73 Goose decoy began with the Holloman rocket sled.
Reorganizations changed the Holloman wing's name to the 2754th Experimental Wing, the 6540th Missile Test Group which had an "Aero-Medical Sub-Unit...to support the Aeromedical Field Laboratory." In May 1952, an additional area was set aside to add to the "Alamogordo bombing range, White Sands proving ground, and the Fort Bliss antiaircraft range".
Development centers
The Holloman Air Development Test Center was established from the 6580th Wing on 10 October 1952 while Colonel Don R. Ostrander was the commander. On October 1, 1953, HADC continued as the test unit after transferring "base operating unit" responsibilities to the 6580th Test Support Wing. ARDC's Dr. Ernst Steinhoff "in the 1950s was building up the Air Development Center at Holloman Air Force Base through most of the decade". The center supported tests for Air Force flights and upcoming manned space flights, e.g., 1955 Project Manhigh, 1959–60 Project Excelsior, the first human tests in the rocket sled firings, and Ham the Chimp's 1959 astronaut training. The Air Force Missile Development Center was designated from HADC on September 1, 1957, the year when a Matador missile from the center crashed in western Colorado The 6571st Aeromedical Research Laboratory was activated 1 December 1961 as an AFMDC unit, and the center's Twin Buttes Instrumentation Annex "16 mi SSW of Alamogordo, NM" transferred under the WSMR Army headquarters in November 1963.
The AFMDC and the 6571st lab were inactivated on August 1, 1970; more than 450 military and 570 civilian positions were lost; and the AFSWC's 6585th Test Group was established as a tenant of Tactical Air Command, to which Holloman AFB transferred. Associate units and programs transferred to other locations within Air Force Systems Command. In addition to the Holloman High Speed Test Trackoperated by the 6585th's "Armaments Division" in 1974, remaining facilities included the Central Inertial Guidance Test Facility, the Radar Target Scatter Facility, and the Target Drone Facility.
