Mary Dixie Dysart
(Cover illustration) Air Force Historical Research Agency,

Maxwell AFB, Alabama. (USAF Photo/Samuel C. Shearin)
The Archives 

at the 

Air Force Historical Research Agency 

Mary Dixie Dysart, PhD 

Published by 

Air Force Historical Research Agency 

Maxwell AFB, AL 

2012

 

Table of Contents 

 Page 

World War I Historical Records ....................................................... 1

Inception of the AAF Historical Division .......................................... 2

Selecting AAF Historians ................................................................ 4

Establishing the AAF Archives ........................................................ 6

Classification of Archival Holdings.................................................. 7

Developing and Defending the Archives .......................................... 8

Moving the Archives to Maxwell AFB .............................................. 14

Records Management and the Archives .......................................... 16

Conclusion ..................................................................................... 25

Appendix: HQ Air Force Historical Research 

Agency and Its Antecedents ............................................................ 41

 

The Archives 

at the 

Air Force Historical Research Agency 

World War I Historical Records

In February 1918, the War Department formed a Historical Branch of the 

General Staff to document the course of World War I. The following May, 

Brigadier General Mason M. Patrick took over as Chief of the Air Service, 

American Expeditionary Forces in France. He appointed Captain Ernest L. 

Jones, Chief of the Information Section, to perform the additional duty of Air 

Service Historian. After the Armistice, General Patrick directed the creation of 

a record of all Air Service activities in Europe in order to form a foundation for 

the development of military aviation. On 4 December 1918, he appointed 

Colonel Edgar S. Gorrell as Assistant Chief of Staff of the Air Service to direct 

the collection and compilation of that record. The Air Service approved the 280 

draft volumes of unit commander reports, narratives, orders, operations 

reports, digests, statistics, photographs, and miscellaneous items provided by 

the units and a two-volume index completed under Gorrell’s direction two 

months later.1 As directed by General Patrick, Gorrell submitted a “Final 

Report,” consisting of 252 pages of photographs, tables and charts, three maps, 

and narratives, for General John J. Pershing, Commander in Chief of the 

American Expeditionary Force. The “Final Report,” which included “The 

Achievement of the Air Service, AEF,” from a separate “Tactical History” 

prepared from the collected documents, was published in a 1921 Air Service 

Information Circular.2 

Implementation of the Army Historical Branch’s plan to publish 

documents and monographs concerning World War I, however, was first 

delayed by an acute paper shortage and then by a lack of funds. In June 1922, 

the congressional Joint Committee on Printing directed that the printing of 

World War I materials cease until they were all ready to be published. 

Consequently, Gorrell’s History of the Air Service, AEF, was not issued until 

1948.3 Moreover, the Air Service historical program languished after the end of 
2 

the war, in part because the 1929 version of Army Regulation 345-105, 

Historical Records and Histories of Organizations, was tailored to the 

organization and functions of ground units rather than air operations.4 The 

Historical Section of the Army War College, designated by the regulation as 

custodian of historical materials, maintained the few documents produced by 

the armed services between the two World Wars.5 In fact, in September 1947, 

when the Army delivered the Army Air Forces (AAF) documents submitted to it 

pursuant to the 1929 regulation to the newly-independent Air Force, they 

consisted primarily of activation and inactivation orders and orders 

redesignating units, which filled only eight four-drawer filing cabinets.6 

The Inception of the AAF Historical Division

In the spring of 1942, U.S. officials undertook an examination of World 

War I records to see if they could provide insights applicable to the current 

conflict. They found that many of those records were missing, and the ones 

that existed often failed to document the reasons particular actions had been 

taken or decisions made. The AAF Historical Officers’ Manual described the 

fate of some World War I documents: 

At the end of the last war huge piles of valuable records were 

destroyed; others were haphazardly baled and dumped into the lap 

of The Adjutant General or upon the doorstep of an inadequate and 

understaffed Historical Section of the Army War College. Still other 

World War records were allowed to remain on posts and in time 

became lost or scattered. More than one collection was burned. 

Still another is said to have suffered an ignominious fate somewhat 

as follows: (1) baled and sent to Washington; (2) stored in a fireproof building; (3) removed to a warehouse; (4) removed to a 

railroad shed; (5) removed to an open siding, placed upon crossties, and covered with tarpaulins until someone needed the 

tarpaulins. Its subsequent fate is unknown ...7 

 

Recognizing the significant impact the dearth of historical information 

from the preceding conflict had on the planning and conduct of the extant one, 

on 4 March 1942 President Franklin D. Roosevelt instructed the Director of the 

Bureau of the Budget to establish the Committee on Records of War 

Administration to “‘[preserve] for those who come after us an accurate and 
3 

objective account of our present experience.’”8 The Adjutant General, Major 

General J. A. Ulio, then promulgated AG letter 210.31 on 15 July 1942 

instructing each of the commanders of the Army’s three major commands—

Army Ground Forces, Army Air Forces, and Services of Supply—to appoint 

historical officers and supply them with the necessary staff to “record the 

administrative activities of their respective headquarters during the current 

war.”9 The organization of a history function within the AAF had begun. Four 

days later, Brigadier General Lawrence S. Kuter, Deputy Chief of the Air Staff, 

directed the AAF Director of Organizational Planning to initiate action 

immediately “‘to establish within the Air Staff an Historical Section capable of 

writing an accurate military history of the Army Air Force.’”10 A 25 June 1942 

memo from Major General M. F. Harmon called for the creation of a Historical 

Branch in the Headquarters US Army Air Forces Office of the Assistant Chief of 

Air Staff, A-2 (Intelligence). Its duties included overseeing the preparation of 

histories of AAF units, making those histories available for AAF use and, 

subject to release restrictions, offering access to other government entities, 

scholars, and the general public.11 On 19 July 1943, AAF Regulation 20-8 

established the Historical Division in accordance with AG 210.31 and under 

the supervision and control of the Assistant Chief of Air Staff, Intelligence.12

The AAF assigned its historical officers first to air forces based in the 

United States; to the various staff offices directorates, and commands; and, 

after the issuance of AG letter 320.21 on 15 November 1943, to deployed forces 

abroad. They wrote the histories of their units’ operations and collected the 

supporting documents that described how assigned personnel performed the 

unit’s mission, provided evidence of critical decisions and the details of the 

decision-making process, explained the unit’s purpose and function within the 

AAF, and specified how the organization carried out its assignments. Initially, 

Colonel Edgar P. Sorensen, Assistant Chief of the Air Staff, A-2, supervised the 

Air Forces Historical Division, and Captain Clanton W. Williams, a professor of 

history on military leave from the University of Alabama, served as Acting Chief 

of the Historical Division and Chief of the Historical Development Section.13 
4 

Colonel Clarence B. Lober served as the first Chief of the Historical Division of 

the Army Air Forces from October 1942 to January 1944. Colonel Lober was 

the military commander of the unit, and Captain Williams carried out day-today operations.14 Captain Williams was designated as Acting Chief of the 

Historical Division on 26 September 1942.15 Williams, who attained the rank 

of colonel in 1945, served as Executive to Colonel Lober from October 1942 to 

November 1943, Acting Chief of the Historical Division from November 1943 

until March 1944, and Chief from March 1944 until February 1945.16 

Selecting AAF Historians

As Lieutenant Colonel Williams, observed in 1943, “... [the Germans] and 

the British and others think of history as an exact science. They profited by 

having made a scientific examination of the results of the last war. Those 

results they fully appreciated when this war began.”17 The U.S. military 

leadership sought the same result. Determined not to fall short again, they 

concentrated on building a first-class historical program. 

From the outset, AAF wanted qualified historians. In a 1943 meeting 

between Lieutenant Colonel Williams, then Executive to the Director of the 

Historical Division, Assistant Chief of the Air Staff (AC/AS), Intelligence, and 

attendees at an A-2 conference in the Pentagon, Williams argued that the Army 

Air Forces deserved to have a decent record kept of the events of World War II. 

He opined, “You cannot expect to sit around and wait for some long-haired 

historian in the future to try to dig back and write a decent history. It can’t be 

done. It wasn’t done after the last war and it can’t be done this time unless 

qualified men are brought together – men with training who know how to do 

the job.”18 Later in the discussion, when someone asked Williams about placing 

a particular person in a unit, he responded: 

That is fine. I don’t know where we can find anybody more 

qualified, than such an experienced officer who also holds the 

Ph.D. degree in history. ... You can rest assured I am going to do my 

dead level best to see that each air force gets a first rate historian. ... 

General [Carl A.] Spaatz wired in that the British have their boys writing 

the actual history as it is taking place, and he wanted to know why we 

didn’t, and to send immediately a group of historians of the caliber of 
5 

Douglas Freeman.19 Well, that brand is hard to find, but highly qualified 

young Ph.D.’s do exist in the AAF and my list of such is growing. I am 

interviewing each man selected not only to see that he is academically 

qualified, but that he also has the personality necessary to the job.20 

 

After the cessation of hostilities, Colonel Williams continued to maintain 

high standards for historians: “Of all the responsibilities none was of greater 

import than that of selecting the individuals who were to do this historical 

work. Against the ideas of some superiors that journalists, ‘writers,’ 

intelligence officers, or returning combat pilots were per se qualified, the AAF 

Historian insisted that there should be maintained at least as the point of 

departure the Ph.D. standard for selection of qualified ‘historians.’”21 Among 

the preflight schools in the Eastern, Central, and Western Flying Training 

Commands, Williams found forty to fifty men with PhDs in history or one of the 

social sciences. The history program was reaching full strength just as ground 

school enrollment was decreasing; therefore, many of the men identified were 

selected to become historians.22 

AAF Letter 20-5, “Maintenance of Historical Program,” dated 17 May 

1946, called for major command history offices to be staffed by “professionally 

trained historians.”23 It defined the major purpose of historical offices as being 

“research and historical analysis of an objective and critical nature to facilitate 

the improvement of staff procedures and administrative methods as well as 

technical and tactical activities throughout the service.”24 

Colonel Williams continued to maintain that trained historians were the 

backbone of an effective history program. In his retirement memorandum, he 

recommended that when war was anticipated, the Historical Office should 

prepare lists of young college professors and graduate students and encourage 

them to join the Reserve Corps so they would be ready to be called to active 

duty. He also proposed that a similar list be made for people holding M.A. 

degrees in history, political science, or other social sciences to serve as a pool 

of historical technicians.25 

 
6 

Establishing the AAF Archives

By February 1943, the Historical Division Archives had begun to collect, 

classify, and catalog material.26 Change No. 3 to Army Regulation (AR) 345-

105, dated 9 March 1943, directed that AAF units forward their historical 

documents to the Commanding General of the Army Air Forces, directed to the 

attention of the Historical Officer, on a monthly schedule. That regulation 

resulted in a dramatic increase in the flow of documents , since it called for the 

preparation of unit histories (including the histories of AAF units), and the 

submission of the AAF historical data to the Commanding General of the Army 

Air Forces for later transmission to The Adjutant General.27 A second 

document, AAF Regulation No. 20-8 dated 19 July 1943, mandated that the 

Historical Division “collect, assimilate, organize, document, and interpret 

contemporary and historical information concerning the growth, the 

administration, and outstanding personnel, and the operations of the Army Air 

Forces.”28 The requirement to manage those materials provided the rationale 

for founding an archive of AAF documents. The AAF Historical Division was 

thus organized in four branches, with the Archives being “established as the 

official depository of documents pertaining to the activity of units serving with 

the AAF.”29 The second branch was responsible for Administrative history, the 

third for operational history, and the fourth collected biographical data on AAF 

personnel.30 By the end of 1943, the Historical Division consisted of the office 

of the Chief, his Executive, and four branches: the Administrative History 

Branch, the Biographical Branch, the Operational History Branch, and the 

Source and Editorial Branch, which comprised the Chronology and Reference 

Section, the Art and Production Section, and the Archives Section. The 

Archives Section held and maintained “all Army Air Forces historical data 

except such as go to other established agencies.”31 In a paper he presented at 

the 30 December 1943 meeting of the American Historical Association, 

Lieutenant Colonel Williams predicted that the Archives “bids fair to be the 

longest-lived unit of the entire historical program.”32 
7 

Classification of Archival Holdings

The Historical Division’s first table of organization, dated 1 September 

1942, established the position of Archivist-Librarian. That person’s duties 

included maintaining the collection of historical materials, developing a 

conservation and protection program for the documents, assisting the 

historical section in identifying new materials, devising a system to classify the 

materials received, and cataloging the archives’ holdings.33 In September 

1943, Dr. Fulmer Mood, formerly of the University of California at Berkeley, 

was selected as Chief of the Archives Section. After developing an alphabetical 

system for classifying documents that used abbreviations representing the 

wings, groups, squadrons, battalions, companies, and detachments that 

originated documents, he left the Archives in the spring of 1944.34 The Mood 

system proved inadequate to manage the multifarious documents generated by 

large organizations. Early in 1946, Dr. Martin P. Claussen, a member of the 

Administrative History Branch of the AAF Historical Division who had 

previously served on the staff of the National Archives, began a study of the 

Mood system. He recommended that it be replaced with a decimal system of 

call numbers based primarily on geographical and organizational factors. He 

began renumbering certain categories of documents before his return to the 

National Archives in October 1946. After his departure, Dr. Claussen’s system 

was modified and simplified by Miss Marguerite E. Kennedy and Miss 

Marguerita McDonald of the Archives staff, and Mr. Frank C. Myers further 

revised it beginning in 1951.35 To distinguish between two major time periods, 

The Archives’ holdings are further divided into two parts: documents created 

before and after 1 July 1950, the date the 374th Troop Carrier Wing 

transported the first US ground combat troops to Pusan after the North Korean 

forces crossed the 38th parallel, invading South Korea. The latter documents’ 

call numbers are preceded by the letter “K” to signify they bear dates after the 

beginning of the Korean War. Each K or non-K document in the collection is 

assigned either a decimal system or a Mood system call number. 
8 

Developing and Defending the Archives

By 1944, the Archives Section had acquired a substantial number of 

documents: “Its work is steadily increasing as materials arrive at an 

accelerating volume. Despite the fact that there are no duplicate holdings nor 

duplication of work done elsewhere in the War Department, and despite and 

continuous effort to have materials in the field culled to include only copies of 

the most important data, the rate of Archival receipts is increasing as unit 

histories and their supporting documents and other valuable data move up 

through channels... .”36 The Archives Section would provide the key to 

preventing a recurrence of the deplorable situation extant at the beginning of 

World War II. Acting Chief of the Historical Division, Lieutenant Colonel 

Clanton W. Williams, noted in a 1943 address to the American Historical 

Association, that 

... after the last war, when men were in a rush to return to their 

homes, vast quantities of military papers were boxed or baled in 

the most haphazard manner imaginable. They were never all 

assembled. There simply was no system of historiography. The 

confusion attendant thereto was so great, the lack of appreciation 

so wide, the inability to understand the basic problems of the 

historians so vast, that the simple truth is that there was no 

scientifically compiled record of experiences upon which the Army 

Air Forces might build for World War II.37

 

The establishment of an archive dedicated to receiving, organizing, 

maintaining, preserving, and making accessible documentation concerning the 

development and employment of U.S. military aviation during World War II 

supported the subsequent reference and research that laid the foundation for 

the evolution of American airpower. 

The AAF Management Control Directorate, the organization that 

supervised administrative services, personnel matters, statistical control, and 

organizational planning, performed its first investigation of the Historical 

Division in January 1944. Its report on the Archives Section advised that 

accessions to the Archives should be restricted and that measures should be 

taken to prevent its “undue expansion” beyond being a “temporary gathering 
9 

point” for unit histories and supporting documents.38 The report called for 

severely restricting the material the Archives received since the Archives was 

“not a permanent record repository—and that it is not its function to preserve 

records simply because, without its interposition, such records would be 

destroyed.”39 It further recommended that the name of the Archives Section be 

changed to the Historical File Section because some unnamed persons “outside 

the Historical Division” objected to the existence of an Archives Section.40 

Colonel William responded that the Archives was “appropriately named for 

what it is” and that the mandate to minimally service the documents that were 

collected ran contrary to the Archives Section’s mission of making the material 

available to those who had a need for it.41 In fact, he later declared that “an 

active post-war program aimed directly at the utilization of this accumulated 

information in the improvement of the Service should pay off many times the 

wartime investment.”42 The Archives Section continued to accept materials it 

received as a result of mandates in AR 345-105, AAF Regulation 20-8, and 

other directives, and prepared to hold them until they were no longer needed 

by its historians or other patrons. Should such a time arrive, they were then to 

be “handed over to their legal owner, The Adjutant General.”43 As of January 

1945, the Archives’ holdings comprised approximately 900 filing cabinets 

containing 300,000 documents. 

In February 1945, a committee of three civilian historians, Dr. Guy 

Stanton Ford, Executive Secretary of the American Historical Association; Dr. 

Joseph R. Strayer of Princeton University; and Dr. John Allen Krout of 

Columbia University, comprising the Historical Advisory Board, assessed the 

holdings of the Archives Section and concluded that they should be 

dramatically reduced and that the plan to write a seven-volume history of the 

Army Air Forces in World War II using material from the Archives as source 

documents should be abandoned. Instead, they recommended that Air Force 

personnel write a series of studies of individual air forces. Opining that 

“[h]istorians may wish that more sources had survived about the Third 

Crusade in 1190, but this does not justify the accumulation of unmanageable 
10

archives today,” they suggested that no AAF histories should be written for 

units below the wing level.44 Colonel Williams, then serving as the AAF 

Historian, noted that the Air Force had already eliminated the lowest echelon 

histories and that the committee had vastly overestimated the Archives’ 

holdings. In his response to the Board’s criticism, he contended that 

The AAF Historian has been equally conscious too that in the 

assembly of these Archives he has run the greatest personal 

political danger. It was here that he has had to fight hardest for 

adequate personnel and it is always the easiest of conclusions to 

reach that the very bulk of these records must indicate inefficiency 

somewhere. Every cursory examination of this problem by 

outsiders has begun with an assumption that the archival receipts 

must be cut. It has been a relief that where more than cursory 

examination has been made the initial impression has been 

dismissed as false. Certainly, any statement that the Archives 

present an unmanageable problem for the historians is simply not 

true. ... 

 

Reasons for jumping to this initial assumption lie in several 

factors, chief being an impossibility for the average mind to 

visualize the bulk of the materials of which theses Archives are the 

cream—cream separated by professionally trained men. ... 

 

There existed in AAF files throughout the world on 31 

December 1944, according to a survey made by the Records 

Administrator of Management Control, three million cubic feet of 

records. If brought together under one roof and filed in four 

drawer cabinets these data would require half the office floor space 

of the Pentagon, and if the war lasts two years longer would 

require all of it. Of this bulk of 3,000,000 cubic feet, the Archives’ 

holding of “supporting documents” of unit histories, numbered 

about 500 cubic feet. This represents a selection of one document 

out of every six thousand extant. 

 

There are, as of this date, approximately 1,000 linear feet of 

Archival holdings—350 feet of unit histories, 500 feet of 

“supporting documents,” and 150 feet of other prime materials 

“cables, etc.” Admittedly to the casual observer the two hundred 

wooden file cabinets all in one large room may present an awesome 

spectacle. Should he open the drawers, though, he would note 

that they are half empty. This is purposely the case, in order to 

allow internal expansion in the simplified “Unit of Origin” filing 
11

system. These files will, no doubt, eventually be filled. In fact, it is 

quite likely that the Archives may eventually be several times their 

current size. 

 

It must not be assumed that the Archivist retains all his 

receipts. The fact is that there is a weekly burning ceremony. 

There is a continuing refining process which has been greatly 

increased since in January 1945 an adequate archival staff was at 

last procured. 

 

Most important, though, in appraising the archival holdings 

are considerations of quality of content and efficiency of service. It 

is of paramount importance that the researchers of the Historical 

Division are extremely pleased with both, and outside patrons have 

often expressed amazement that they have found exactly what they 

needed—and quickly, more quickly that service obtained in the 

Library of Congress, The Adjutant General’s Central Files, or the 

National Archives.45

 

Two attempts by outside agencies bent on gaining control of material 

held in the AAF Archives were fended off in February 1945: one by the 

Collection Division, Assistant Chief to the Air Staff (AC/AS) Intelligence, which 

recommended the transfer of the materials to the collection division, and one 

from Assistant Chief of Staff (AC/S) G-2, General Clayton L. Bissell, who 

recommended that The Adjutant General create a central depository for all War 

Department historical materials. Both those proposals were rejected in a 

memorandum written by Colonel Wilfred. J. Paul, who was assigned in March 

1945 as the Historical Division’s military Professional Executive, then Chief of 

the Historical Division, and finally as AAF Historian.46 He argued against 

incorporating the Archives’ holdings into the mass of current intelligence data, 

averring that “[t]he Archives is a place where historical records and documents 

are preserved as evidence of facts and are utilized for historical research by 

historical personnel.”47 He went on to say that “[t]he system of arrangement 

used in the Archives has been coordinated with and approved by personnel of 

the National Archives; War Department Adjutant General and War Department 

Historical Division,” and that “the present procedures in Archives Section are 
12

well adapted to the purpose for this which collection is being prepared.”48 He 

further noted that “in the screening and cataloging of incoming historical 

papers, important historical information is abstracted and a careful scrutiny is 

made of the product of field historians. This can be done only by historians 

and should not be delegated to a Librarian.”49 He concluded that “[t]he 

professional historian is best equipped by background and training to arrange 

and service historical data for research purposes.” 50

As World War II drew to a close, the Historical Division and its Archives 

continued to grow and evolve. In an 8 June 1945 Memorandum for Record, 

Colonel Paul, as Chief of the Historical Division, set out the objectives of the 

Division. They included providing “a clearing house of information comprised 

of the AAF Historical Studies, unit histories with their accompanying 

supporting documents, and other documents of high significance.”51 In the 

same document, Colonel Paul predicted that the archives would be of lasting 

value in the future. On 23 August 1945, a new iteration of AAF Regulation No. 

20-8 redesignated the Historical Division of AC/AS, Intelligence as the AAF 

Historical Office and transferred it from A2 to the office of the Secretary of the 

Air Staff.52 On 1 September 1946, Dr. Albert F. Simpson succeeded Clanton W. 

Williams as Air Historian.53 

The Advisory Historical Committee that had been created as a result of 

the report of the Historical Advisory Board issued a forceful recommendation 

against combining the Archives with any other collection.54 The 20 February 

1946 “Historical Officers’ Circular No. 6” reported that the Archives, “a rich and 

skillfully selected collection of military documents,” had been recognized by 

staff and field personnel and the public as a “collection ... of extreme value.”55 

It noted that “an increasing work-load is being imposed on the staff of the 

Sources and Editorial Branch. The Army-Navy Staff College, the Command 

and General Staff School, the War Department General Staff offices, the 

Strategic Bombing Survey, the various Air Staff Agencies, the Air Forces 

Center, and the new AAF School are all drawing heavily upon this source of 

information.”56 After his retirement, Clanton W. Williams continued to promote 
13

the collection, describing the state of the Archives as “currently most active, 

providing widely varying data not only to historians but also to many military 

agencies.”57 

The AAF had established Overseas Organizational History Branch in 

Baltimore, Maryland, in August 1945 to complete the histories that historians 

assigned to units stationed abroad were unable to finalize before they returned 

to the United States. It eliminated the Branch on 30 June 1946, before that 

task had been completed.58 After the Overseas Organizational History Branch 

was discontinued, its documents were incorporated into the Historical 

Division’s Archives, increasing the number of documents it held to 400,000, 

occupying 8,000 linear feet and representing “one of the largest [archives] in 

the world entirely devoted to the history of military aviation.”59 

The 1 May 1946 revision of AR 345-105 mandated that Army Air Forces 

material, unit journals, and supporting documents compiled in troop units 

should be marked “Historical Data” and submitted to the Commanding 

General, Army Air Forces, for transmission to the Historical Records Section, 

War Department Records Branch, The Adjutant General’s office–thus ensuring 

that historical documents would continue to enter the Archives. AAF Letter 20-

5, published on 17 May 1946, required the annual submission of historical 

data only from major commands, which reduced the flow of materials from 

subordinate units and diminished the intake of lower-echelon records into the 

Archives.60 Under the provisions of the National Security Act of 1947, the 

United States Air Force became a separate service on 18 September 1947. Air 

Force Regulation 210-3, Historical Program and Procedure, dated 14 December 

1948, replaced AR 345-106 for Air Force activities and superseded AAF 

Regulation 20-8 and AAF Letter 20-5. It directed commands, numbered air 

forces, and similar organizations to prepare detailed narrative histories and 

supporting documents for submission to the Air Historical Group, Air 

University (AU), which was charged with preparing Air Force histories and 

“assembling and maintaining an Air Force historical archives.”61 
14

Moving the Archives to Maxwell AFB

The FY 1947 and FY 1948 federal budgets effected post-war cuts and 

necessitated reductions in the number of personnel assigned to the 

Washington, DC, area. Therefore, AAF Regulation No. 20-22, 13 August 1947, 

called for the reassignment of the Air Historical Office to Air University and its 

redesignation as an AU liaison office. At an August 1947 meeting held in the 

offices of the Deputy Chief of Staff, General C. C. Chauncey, made it clear that 

the transfer was “purely a budgetary expedient” to cut the number of civilians 

on the Air Historical Office staff, and that the Historical Office would “continue 

to function as an integral part of the Headquarters representing the Air Force 

in all historical matters.”62 Nonetheless, AAF Regulation 20-23, dated 17 

September 1947, which returned four other activities transferred under 

Regulation 20-22 to their former parent organizations, failed to assign the Air 

Historical Office to Headquarters, USAF. 

In a 15 December 1947 memo, Colonel Wilfred J. Paul, Chief of the Air 

Historical Office, argued that the Air Historical Office needed to remain on the 

same level as the Army Historical Division and the Office of Naval History, both 

of which functioned as departments of their assigned headquarters. He 

submitted a draft regulation establishing the Air Historical Division within 

Headquarters, USAF, but that regulation was not approved. The Air Historical 

Office remained assigned to Air University.63 Colonel Paul and the Deputy 

Chief of the Air Staff discussed returning the Historical Group to the Air Staff 

as soon as the budgetary problems were resolved; but despite the fact that the 

Air Historical Office remained in Washington, it continued under the control of 

AU. 

General Muir S. Fairchild, AU’s commanding general, lobbied relentlessly 

for the relocation of the Air Historical Group to Maxwell AFB, Alabama. His 

argument that the records held by the Group should be available for research 

at Air University and that its operations could best be carried out in the 

“scholarly atmosphere of the Air University” finally succeeded in August 

1948.64 The Historical Division had originally been located in the AAF Annex 
15

#1 at Gravelly Point, Virginia, but it moved in October 1946 to the Pentagon. 

Pressure for space led to its relocation in July 1948, to Temporary Building “R” 

at 4th and Jefferson Drive, SW. The following October, it moved to Temporary 

Building “U” at 12th and Constitution, NW.65 Less than a year later, the 

organization prepared to relocate to Alabama. 

The Air Force established the Air University Historical Liaison Office in 

Washington, DC, by a letter dated 8 August 1949. It operated from the 

Temporary “U” Building at 12th Street and Constitution Avenue until the 

Secretary of the Air Force requested its relocation to the Pentagon to eliminate 

the time spent in trips back and forth between the two buildings.66 The liaison 

office facilitated the transfer of materials to Maxwell and coordinated support of 

the Army Air Forces seven-volume history of World War II. 67 The Air Historical 

Office and the Archives moved from Washington, DC, to Maxwell AFB from 12 

to 26 September 1949, and the Air Historical Group occupied Building 910, a 

12,950 square foot stucco structure.68

Ceremony Marking Publication of The Army Air Forces in World War 

II held in the Office of the Secretary of the Air Force, the Hon. James H. 

Douglas, Jr., 30 October 1958. (Left to Right, - General Thomas D. 

White, Chief of Staff, USAF; Chancellor Lawrence A. Kimpton, University 

of Chicago; W. F. Craven, Princeton University; Mr. Douglas; J. L. Cate, 

University of Chicago; Colonel G. C. Cobb, Director, Research Studies 

Institute, Air University; Albert F. Simpson, Chief, USAF History Division) 

(USAF Photo). 

 
16

On 16 August 1949, the Air University Library was redesignated the 

Department of the Air Force Library, perhaps to underscore the fact that the 

library was a U.S. Government Record Depository. The Air Historical Group 

was incorporated into the Library, and the Library was then reorganized. A 

merger of the Library’s Documentary Research Section and the Air Historical 

Group created the Historical Division. The new Division comprised the Studies 

and Research Branch, made up of the Air Historical Group’s Studies and 

Editorial Branch and the AU Library’s Documentary Research Division, and the 

Archives Branch, which combined the Archives Branch of the Air Historical 

Group and the Archives Unit of the Library. The Department of the Air Force 

Library established an Administrative Section, and the Library Division was 

organized into six branches according to function. A number of meetings were 

held about combining of the documents of the Library Division and the 

Historical Division. Discussions of those points continued as the Archives 

Division moved from Building 910 to building 914.69

Records Management and the Archives

The records created by the Army (and the Army Air Corps) during World 

War II were subject to records management regulations set out in War 

Department Technical Manual 12-259, Records Administration: Disposition of 

Records, dated July 1945 and its later revisions. Special Regulation 345-920-

1, dated 15 March 1949, called from the transfer of all War Department and 

Army agency records meriting permanent or long-term retention to one of 

several Army record depositories by 30 June 1949, but it did not apply to Air 

Forces records.70 Army Regulation 345-911/Air Force Regulation 181-5, 

Records and Reports: Administration by Department of the Army of Noncurrent 

Records of Department of the Air Force, mandated that “Army records centers 

will continue to maintain, service, and effect disposition of noncurrent records 

of the Department of the Air Force, both headquarters and field activities, with 

the exception of certain classes of noncurrent records which have previously 

been designated by the Secretary of the Air Force to be centralized and 

administered by Air Force records depositories ....”71 Those depositories 
17

included The Air Force Contract Records Depository; the Air Force Materiel 

Engineering, Research, and Development Records Depository; and the Air 

Force Motion Picture Film Depository, located at Wright Field, Ohio; the Air 

Force Weather Records Depository, in New Orleans, Louisiana; and the Air 

Force Still Photography Depository and the Air Force Aeronautical Charts 

Depository, located in Washington, DC.72 The 13 January 1950 revision of 

AFR 210-3 gave the Air University Command responsibility for maintaining the 

Air Force Historical Program (including sustaining the Air Force historical 

archives as the repository for historical records); required the production of 

semi-annual narrative histories and supporting documents by major 

commands, numbered air forces, and comparable organizations; and mandated 

the collection of historical materials by echelons below the numbered air force 

level.73 

 A 18 March 1950 letter from Colonel John J. Donovan, the commanding 

officer of the Records Administration Center, concerning missing records for 

Army organizations—particularly Air Force organization files—contended that 

“Air University, Historical Division, Maxwell Air Force Base, Alabama may have 

in its custory [sic] organization records which are necessary for the 

administration of both the Army and Air Force AG [Adjutant General] 

functions” and recommended that all records other than “actual histories” be 

transferred to the Kansas City Records Center, with any material necessary for 

the preparation of histories being returned on loan to the Air Historical 

program.74 The letter was forwarded to the Commanding General, Air 

University, on 12 April 1950 for his comments.75 On 28 September 1950, 

Colonel L. L. Judge, the Air Adjutant General, wrote to the Commander, Air 

University, informing him that the Department of the Army had inquired about 

records held by the Historical Division of Air University. Referring to the 

regulation directing the storage of all noncurrent Air Force records, he 

maintained that its intent was “to make all [emphasis in original] records 

accumulated by Air Force activities readily available to all [emphasis in 

original] Air Force, military and other Federal Government activities the public 
18

in general, to the extent they are entitled to them.”76 Colonel Judge noted that 

the Department of the Army and the Air Adjutant General’s office received 

numerous inquiries relating to current mission needs and planning concerns, 

but records from which to respond to those inquiries were unavailable. He 

averred that the problem had arisen because in some instances historians 

collected the record copies of documents to use as sources for their histories 

and later included the same record copies as supporting documents to the 

narrative. Judge acknowledged that the “temporary custody” of Air Force 

records for historical research or use by Air University students was 

acceptable, but argued that 

... the use or custody of such records by any Air Force activity or 

other agency, in a manner which will: preclude their use by other 

interested activities; unduly hamper the Department of the Army 

in servicing Air Force Records; destroy the integrity and 

administrative origin of records accumulated by Air Force 

activities; result in the loss of control over the whereabouts of Air 

Force records; or defeat the purpose or objectives of directives, 

policies and instructions designed to carry out the statutory and 

moral responsibilities of the Secretary of the Air Force, with respect 

to the preservation or disposition of Air Force records must be 

prohibited.77 

 

He directed that Air University create an inventory of all supporting 

documents, that the materials identified be segregated to allow inquiries to be 

answered, that they be readied for shipment to “appropriate records 

depositories” as the events they described were covered in the seven-volume set 

of the Air Force history of World War II aviation being written at that time. He 

also mandated that a revision of paragraph 5 of Air Force Regulation 210-3 be 

prepared requiring supporting documents to be “extra copies” rather than 

record copies of documents.78 In order to ensure the proper management of the 

record copies of Air Force documents, Air Force Regulation Change 210-3B, 

Historical Data Program and Procedure, was issued on 12 December 1950. It 

stipulated that supporting documents would consist of extra copies only, not 

original or record copies of documents.79 
19

Colonel Wilfred J. Paul, the former Chief of the Air Historical Office and 

current Director of the Air University Library, wrote to Colonel (later Major 

General) Richard A. Grussendorf,80 executive officer to Chief of Staff of the Air 

Force General Hoyt Vandenberg, regarding the records question. He noted that 

the documents held by the Archives had been gathered under the provisions of 

Army Regulation 345-108 and subsequently under Air Force Regulation 210-

3.81 These regulations covered historical documents, and did not deal with 

records management regulations for the record copies of documents. In fact, 

Historical Officers Circular No. 2, Instructions for Air Force Historical Officers of 

Staffs, Offices, and Commands, dated 26 May 1943, specifically referred to 

including “copies” of supporting documents with the unit histories.82 It 

mandated that supporting documents such as letters, telegrams, and 

memorandums, be “certified as true copies.” It further stipulated that “[i]f 

original documents are still in current use or are earmarked for agencies other 

than the Army Air Forces Historical Division, or if there are no carbon copies 

available, exact transcripts should be made, and the disposition made of the 

originals should be indicated.”83 Historical Officers Circular No. 5, Form for 

Unit Histories, however, was inconsistent with Circular No. 2. It instructed the 

field historian to be sure supporting documents were “originals or true 

copies.”84 

Colonel Paul presented a brief overview of the circumstances that led to 

the location of the Archives at Air University in his letter to Colonel 

Grussendorf, informing him that “General Arnold, General Eaker, and General 

Fairchild considered it of tremendous importance to the Air Force.”85 He 

declared that relocating the archival holdings was not in the best interest of the 

Air Force or other users of the material: “Placing this material in a depository 

at Kansas City or St. Louis will not only put it out of the direct custody of the 

Air Force but will also deny its use to Air Historians, researchers, and Air Force 

Officers at Maxwell. Unless conditions have changed radically at the St. Louis 

depository valuable Air Force historical documents would become so integrated 

with morning reports, duty rosters, etc. that our documents would be the 
20

needle in the haystack.”86 Colonel Paul opined that Colonel Judge was being 

“misled by his civilian Records Administrator who for five years has tried to 

take our Historical Archives, but who has no understanding of their value to 

the USAF in their present location and use.”87 Colonel Paul also wrote 

“Correspondence re: ‘Location of Records,’” dated 5 October 1950, which set 

out a rationale for not complying with the mandate to catalog the Archives’ 

holdings and deliver them to a federal records depository. He contended that 

the Historical Division had insufficient personnel to catalog each of the 

700,000 documents, making it impossible to create a descriptive inventory. He 

estimated that such a project would require twenty man-years. He requested 

ten additional civilian employees to accomplish the task, which he estimated 

would take two years to complete. Colonel Paul then averred that the materials 

in the Archives were sufficiently organized to allow for prompt responses to 

inquiries. He included the requested draft change to AFR 210-3 with the 

correspondence.88 Furthermore, the Historical Division of the Air University 

Library maintained that it had turned over all its organizational records to the 

Air University Records Administrator for shipment to the appropriate federal 

records center in February 1950.89 The materials held in the Historical 

Division’s Archives remained in its keeping, and the collection continued to 

grow. By 1951, National Archives personnel had concluded that the Air 

Historical Group retained about 8,000 feet of wartime records.90

AFR 210-3, Historical Data, dated 11 March 1955, designated the 

Archives as the Office of Record for Air Force histories.91 It directed each major 

air command, numbered air force (NAF) or comparable organization, wing and 

independent unit below the NAF level, and joint and combined operation and 

headquarters for which the Air Force had primary responsibility to compile a 

semiannual narrative history with supporting documents and submit it to the 

USAF Historical Division at Maxwell AFB. There they were to be held in the Air 

Force historical archives and permanently preserved.92

During an August 1955 meeting, Miss Marguerite Kennedy, Chief of the 

Archives Branch, and Mr. Albert J. Petroski, Kansas City Records Center, 
21

reached an agreement to transfer all Air Force unit histories and supporting 

documents from that facility to the Archives.93 The transfer took place between 

1956 and 1960. The materials were shipped in 1,072 footlockers94 (or the 

equivalent). Archives Branch personnel incorporated approximately 35 percent 

of the material, comprising 929 cubic feet, into the collection by 26 July 1961, 

and destroyed the remaining 65 percent (1,846 cubic feet), which was 

duplicative or which Archives personnel determined to be of marginal value.95

The Archives Branch received one additional box of documents from the 

Kansas City Records Center in August 1961 and was slated to receive 

additional material from time to time as the Records Center proceeded with its 

inventory.96

 

Archives Stacks in 1956, (Left to Right) George Pugh and Airman Lewis 

(USAF Photo). 

 

In 1963, the Air Force Historian initiated a request to microfilm the 

rapidly deteriorating documents held by the USAF Historical Division.97

Recordak Corporation personnel surveyed the collection in recommended that 

it be microfilmed.98 HQ USAF approved the proposal in February 1967, and 

funds to begin the project became available in FY 1969. Due to problems 

obtaining security clearances for the contractors, the Historical Research 

Center made little progress in microfilming that year; but it expended the funds 
22

in FY 1970 to microfilm 2.2 million pages.99 The Center wished to keep the 

original documents to support Air Force, Department of Defense, and other 

requests for information rather than eventually retiring them to the National 

Archives and Records Service (NARS). On 18 September 1970, H. G. Geiger, 

Acting Chief of the Department of the Air Force’s Documentation Systems 

Division, Directorate of Information, wrote to James B. Rhoads, the Archivist of 

the United States, concerning the Office of Air Force History’s draft policy 

guidance and specifications for microfilming historical documents. Paragraph 

8a of that draft stipulated that “when documents of permanent value are 

microfilmed, the camera master silver negative and the positive silver print 

made from it will be retired to the National Archives after they have been 

inspected and found to be adequate substitutes for the original documents. 

Original documents would not be retired.”100 Mr. Rhoads, replied to Mr. 

Geiger’s letter on 5 October 1970, stating that “[t]he policy guidelines and 

specifications set forth in your letter of September 18 meet with our 

approval.”101 Mr. Rhoads added that NARS would publish regulations in early 

1971 concerning the storage and processing of microfilm.102 A subsequent 

1971 agreement between NARS and the Air Force Historical Research Center 

(AFHRC) allowed AFHRC to fulfill its records management obligations by 

providing microfilm instead of hard copy records to NARS.103 

On 3 December 1970, Mr. Geiger wrote to the Air Force Chief Historian 

recommending that Air Force Manual (AFM) 12-50, table 201-1, Disposition of 

Air Force Documentation, be changed to read as follows: 

a. retire original documents as permanent if they have not or will 

not be microfilmed. 

 

b. destroy original documents after 1 year or when no longer 

needed, whichever is later, provided microfilm has been inspected 

and found acceptable. 

 

c. retire original camera master silver negative and first positive 

silver print therefrom, to the National Archives 6 months after 

microfilm has been accepted.104

 
23

The Air Force’s Directorate of Administration submitted a request for authority 

to dispose of records to NARS on 12 July 1971 containing the above provisions. 

NARS approved that request on 6 October 1971.105 That disposition authority 

was subsequently reflected in Air Force Manual (AFM) 12-50, Table 201-1, 

Disposition of Air Force Documentation, and Air Force Regulation 12-40, 

Documentation Storage and Retrieval (DS&R) Systems, which required that 

when documents having a permanent retention were microfilmed, “the camera 

master silver negative and the positive silver print made from it” be retired to 

the National Archives or other appropriate records center.106 NARS published 

its rule expanding the General Services Administration’s rules on 

micrographics on 15 March 1979. It addressed microfilming requirements for 

“[a]gencies proposing to retain the original records in accordance with the 

approved records disposition schedule.”107

To comply with 1971 agreement, the Air Force expended over $1 million 

microfilming AFHRC’s holdings and shipping those rolls to NARS. By 1979, 

only 5,000 rolls of film remained to be forwarded to the National Archives.108 In 

response to an April 1979 notification that the Albert F. Simpson Historical 

Research Center (AFSHRC)109 was ready to ship additional microfilm, NARS 

informed Center personnel that it would not accept the microfilm because it 

wished to change the 1971 agreement.110 On 3 December 1979, after some 

correspondence within Air Force channels and between the Air Force and the 

National Archives, James E. O’Neill, Acting Archivist of the United States, wrote 

to Colonel Van L. Crawford, Jr., the Air Force’s Director of Administration, 

maintaining that NARS would like to suspend that agreement due to security 

issues. Although only 2 percent of the 10,141 pre-1950 microfilm rolls sent to 

NARS were classified, National Archives personnel feared that problems could 

arise in the future with records dated after 1950 and records exempt from 

disclosure under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA). Nonetheless, due to 

the amount of money the Air Force had spent on providing NARS and Air Force 

agencies with microfilm copies of the documents and NARS’s “initial 

concurrence in accepting the microfilm copies,” Mr. O’Neill agreed to accession 
24

and service the pre-1950 microfilm that AFSHRC had submitted to NARS for a 

two-year trial period.111 During that time, NARS planned to assess the 

personnel and money requirements involved in reviewing the microfilm for 

security purposes and supervising researchers using those rolls. Mr. O’Neill 

stated that NARS would make a decision as to whether it should continue to 

accept microfilm instead of paper documents during that time, but he had “no 

objection” to continuing to accept the negative and positive microfilm rolls 

dated after 1950 that AFSHRC was submitting and “providing courtesy storage” 

for them without accessioning them into NARS’s holdings.112 He further 

requested that AFSHRC suspend the disposition authority that gave it the right 

to destroy the original documents after acceptable microfilm copies had been 

made and one year had elapsed, although AFSHRC was not currently 

exercising that right.113 Accordingly, Mr. Lloyd Cornett, the Director of 

AFSHRC, directed Center personnel to begin shipping negative and positive 

microfilm rolls to NARS on 17 December 1979.114 NARA declined to accept 

further shipments of the original negative and duplicate positive microfilm rolls 

in 2003.115 

The records disposition instructions for the Air Force Historical Research 

Agency’s (AFHRA) holdings currently in force remain the same as those set out 

in 1971. When the Air Force revised the Air Force Records Information 

Management System (AFRIMS) table and rule covering those documents on 13 

April 2011, National Archives and Records Administration (NARA)116 Appraiser 

Rich Noble determined that the correct disposition of the documents in 

question was the one last approved in the 1 March 1996 version of AFMAN 37-

139. That publication called for them to be “retired as permanent upon 

inactivation if they have not or will not be microfilmed,” and, if they were 

microfilmed, to “destroy paper records after 1 year or when no longer needed, 

whichever is later, provided microfilm has been inspected and found 

acceptable” and to “[r]etire original camera master silver negative, and first 

positive silver print therefrom, to the National Archives ... 6 months after 

microfilm has been accepted.”117
25

Conclusion

AFHRA has thus remained the custodian of the hard copy documents 

entrusted to its predecessor organizations in the aftermath of World War II and 

of the histories and other materials subsequently added to its holdings. These 

documents are necessary to supplement AFHRA’s microfilm records and serve 

as source materials for the Agency historians and archivists who provide 

historical services to Air Force organizations around the world and answer 

requests for information from the Air Force, government agencies, and the 

general public. They serve as a resource for scholars and other researchers 

and support professional military education programs at Air University. In 

their present location, they can be most readily available and expeditiously 

used to provide the background material to inform the decision-making process 

at the highest levels of government, to support veterans, and to illuminate the 

actions and decisions of the air arm for ordinary citizens. The vision of 

pioneers in the Air Force history program for the creation and maintenance of a 

centralized repository for Air Force historical documents came to fruition at the 

Air Force Historical Research Agency. 

Today the Air Force Historical Research Agency is the repository for the 

collection of Air Force historical papers begun in 1942. Its holdings comprise 

more than 70,000,000 pages representing the world’s largest and most 

valuable organized collection of documents concerning US military aviation. 

AFHRA’s holdings are readily accessible. Approximately 350 veterans, 

scholars, and members of the general public visit the Agency’s reading rooms 

each year, and over 4,400 documents are available on AFHRA’s public web 

page. AFHRA employees answer an average of over 3,500 requests for 

information annually from Air Force personnel, the Department of Defense and 

other government agencies, Congress, veterans, and individuals from around 

the world. Documents held by AFHRA are microfilmed or digitized and 

uncontrolled unclassified copies are available for sale to the public. 

The majority of AFHRA’s holdings consist of unit histories that chronicle 

US air forces’ operations and activities in war and peace from WWI to the 
26

present day. These materials provide the data and historical perspective that 

support the planning and decision-making process throughout the Air Force. 

These records are in constant use, and they often contain the answer to 

complex problems. For example, records and publications from the inactivated 

Strategic Air Command provided information vital to the stand-up of Air Force 

Global Strike Command, and researchers use World War II mission reports to 

determine the location of unexploded ordnance before initiating construction in 

Germany. AFHRA also maintains the organizational history of Air Force units 

and establishments, determines their lineage and honors, and administers Air 

Force organizational emblems. These records inform Air Force-wide 

organizational decisions and promote esprit de corps and knowledge of their 

heritage among Airmen. 

AFHRA houses a wide variety of specialized collections. Its 786 

groupings of personal papers include those of pioneers in flight, significant Air 

Force leaders and policymakers, and others who contributed to the evolution of 

American military aviation. In addition the Agency maintains approximately 

100 Air Force Persons of Exceptional Prominence (PEP) Records Collections. It 

comprises more than 2,600 oral history interviews concerning matters of 

importance to the air forces dating from the 1920s, the Vietnam War, and the 

development and acquisition of Air Force weapons systems. Interviewees 

include individuals who led the Army Air Forces in the years before and during 

World War II and, beginning in 1976, all former Secretaries of the Air Force, 

Chiefs of Staff, Major Command Commanders and Commanders-in-Chief, and 

the Chief Master Sergeants of the Air Force. The collection also contains 

interviews with personnel involved in Air Force operations abroad conducted by 

deployed historians, and it includes a large number of interviews concerning 

U.S. military operations carried out in the aftermath of the 11 September 2001 

terrorist attacks. 

The extensive aircraft records held at AFHRA contain abundant 

information about the history of individual aircraft and the circumstances 

under which they were retired from the Air Force inventory. The Agency’s 
27

holdings include individual aircraft record cards, aircraft accident reports 

dated prior to 1956, and World War II missing air crew and escape and evasion 

reports. A treasure trove for hobbyists, authors, and historians, these records, 

in combination with the corresponding unit histories, are used today by the 

Joint POW/MIA Accounting Command to locate and recover human remains 

from prior conflicts. 

AFHRA’s leadership and staff continuously seek new opportunities to 

preserve Air Force history and to make more resources available to their 

customers. The Agency has collaborated with Air Combat Command Cultural 

Resources to establish and maintain a unique collection of architectural 

drawings for Air Force facilities of high historical mission importance or those 

that represent notable architectural and engineering achievement. When 

completed, the collection will comprise from 25,000 to 28,000 drawings dated 

primarily from 1938 through 1972 and include very rare or significant 

structures of the Army Air Corps and the Army Air Forces. This collection 

with be of great benefit to engineers and architectural historians. 

Seventy years ago, Brigadier General Lawrence S. Kuter charged the AAF 

director of Organizational Planning to establish an Air Staff Historical Section 

to record the service’s history “‘while it is hot.’”118 Those histories, crafted in 

the heat of battle, formed the basis for the Archives’ collection. Only a few 

years later, Colonel Clanton W. Williams reported that the Archives contained 

“the cream of AAF records,”119 carefully selected by professionals dedicated to 

preserving a permanent history of the Army Air Forces. The AAF Historical 

Division and its successor organizations embraced those standards, 

maintaining the Air Force’s institutional memory and enabling it to prevail in 

current operations and plan for future ones. That legacy now belongs to the 

Air Force Historical Research Agency, which continues to collect, preserve, and 

make available those unparalleled documents. 

 

 
28

 

Endnotes 

1Art (U), Lloyd H. Cornett, Jr., “United States Air Force Historical 

Collection,” in Catherine D. Scott, ed., Aeronautics and Space Flight Collections

(New York: Hayworth Press, ca. 1985), 98. 

 

2Book (U), Maurer Maurer, The U.S. Air Service in World War I, vol. 1 

(Washington, DC: Office of Air Force History, 1978), 1-14, 167. The unit 

histories incorporated in Gorrell’s History are recorded on 58 reels of microfilm 

that are included in the AFHRA collection. For an overview of the collection 

and preservation of documents relating to U.S. air operations in World War I, 

see the “Introduction” to Maurer Maurer’s The U.S. Air Service in World War I, 

volume I. 

 

3Art (U), Stetson Conn, Historical Work in the United States Army 1862-

1954, (Washington, DC: U.S. Army Center for Military History, 1980) n. p., 

available at http://warchronicle.com/us/general/historicalwkptone.htm#*15*

(25 May 2012). 

 

4Art (U), Lloyd H. Cornett, Jr., “United States Air Force Historical 

Collection,” in Catherine D. Scott, ed., Aeronautics and Space Flight Collections. 

(New York: Hayworth Press, ca. 1985), 98, available at 

http://books.google.com/books?id=j8wj0kv_NVgC&pg=PA106&lpg=PA106&dq=

%22dr.+fulmer+mood%22&source=bl&ots=5Ie8IYtkj&sig=0XFkd065Zmbie0IOn7YycRZxfsE&hl=en&sa=X&ei=XKKyTnmO4306AGvt7mQCQ&ved=0CEIQ6AEwBQ#v=onepage&q=%22dr.%20fulmer

%20mood%22&f=false (23 April 2012). 

 

5Paper (U), Chauncey E. Saunders, “History of the Archives Historical 

Division Air University Library 1942 through 1949,” n. d., 1, IRIS # 122717. 

 

6Art (U), Marguerite K. Kennedy, “The Archives of the Historical Division, 

USAF,” in American Archivist, 17, no. 2 (April 1954), 126-27, available at 

http://archivists.metapress.com/content/42897783;13787744/ (7 Feb 2012). 

7Draft (U), AAF Historical Officers’ Manual, 1943, 2. IRIS #00116405. 

 
29

8Art (U), William C. Binkley, “Two World Wars and American Historical 

Scholarship,” The Mississippi Valley Historical Review, 33, no. 1 (Jun 1946), 

18, available at http://www.jstor.org/stable/1896733 (20 Oct 2011). 

 

9AG letter (U), MG J. A. Ulio, The Adjutant General,” to Commanding 

Generals Army Ground Forces, Army Air Forces, and Services of Supply, 

“Appointment of Historical Officers,” 15 July 1942, IRIS #116436. 

 

 10Directive (U), Brig Gen Lawrence S. Kuter, Deputy Chief of the Air 

Staff, [Army Air Force Historical Program], 19 July 1942, quoted in Article (U), 

Lt. Col. Clanton W. Williams, Acting Chief, Historical Division, AC/AS, 

Intelligence, “Army Air Force Historical Program,” n. d., IRIS #116419. 

 11Paper (U), Dr. Chauncey E. Sanders, “History of the Archives Historical 

Division, Air University Library 1942-1949,” n. d., IRIS # 1143907; Paper (U), 

“USAF Historical Archives 1942-1953,” 2, n. d., IRIS #1143907. 

 

12Reg (U), AAF Regulation No. 20-8, Organization: AAF Historical 

Division, 19 Jul 1943, IRIS #116429. 

 

13Msg (U), Colonel Edgar P. Sorensen, Assistant Chief of the Air Staff, A2, to Historical Division, A-2, “Army Air Forces Historical Division,” 26 Sep 

1942, IRIS #00116409; Book (U), Richard H. Kohn, “Forward to the New 

Imprint,” to Plans and Early Operations, January 1939 to August 1942, Wesley 

Frank Craven and James Lea Cate, eds., vol. 1, The Army Air Forces in World 

War II (Washington: Office of Air Force History, 1983), ix. 

 

14Art (U), Karl L. Trever, “News Notes,” American Archivist, 6, no. 2 (April 

1943), 135, available at 

http://archivists.metapress.com/content/3x284626q417t000/ (20 Oct 2011); 

Art. (U), Bell I. Wiley, Historical Program of the U.S. Army 1939 to Present 

[1945], 13, available at http://www.history.army.mil/reference/History/wileyfm.htm (20 Oct 2011). 

 

15Msg (U), Colonel Edgar P. Sorensen, Assistant Chief of the Air Staff, A2, to Historical Division, A-2, “Army Air Forces Historical Division,” 26 Sept 

1942, IRIS #00116409. 

 

16Paper (U), “History of the Historical Division (July-Dec 1949),” IRIS 

#00913622. 

 
30

17Paper (U), “Colonel Williams – Historical Division, AC/AS, Intelligence,” 

ca. 1943, 6, IRIS #00122670 

 

18Ibid. 

 

19Douglas Southall Freeman (1886-1953) earned a PhD in history from 

Johns Hopkins University. His publications included Pulitzer Prize-winning, 

multivolume biographies of Robert E. Lee and George Washington, and he 

served as the editor of The Richmond News Leader. 

 

20Paper (U), “Colonel Williams – Historical Division, AC/AS, Intelligence,” 

ca. 1943, 3-4, IRIS #00122670. 

 

21Paper (U), Clanton W. Williams, “AAF Historical Program,” n.d., 7, IRIS 

#00122670. 

 

22Ibid. 

 

23Ltr (U), AAF Letter 20-5, “Maintenance of Historical Program,” 17 May 

1946. 

 

24Ibid. 

 

25Memo (U), Colonel Clanton W. Williams, AAF Historian, to Chief, AAF 

Historical Office, “Final Report of the Retiring AAF Historian,” 1 Sep 1946, IRIS 

#00122670. 

 

26Paper (U), Dr. Chauncey E. Saunders, “History of the Archives 

Historical Division, Air University Library 1942-1949,” n. d., IRIS # 1143907; 

Paper (U), “USAF Historical Archives 1942-1953,” 2, n. d., IRIS #1143907. 

 

27Reg (U), AR 345-105, Change No. 3, Historical Records and Histories of 

Organizations, 9 March 1943. Maintaining the noncurrent records of the War 

Department was one of the duties of The Adjutant General. 

 

28Paper (U), Maj. Thad S. Strange, USAFR, “Development of the USAF 

Historical Program,” March 1951, IRIS # 00913623; AAF Regulation No. 20-8, 

“Organization: AAF Historical Division,” 19 Jul 1943, IRIS #01105702 

 

29Circular (U), Overseas Historical Officers Circular No. 1, “Instructions 
31

for Air Force Historical Officers in Theaters of Operations,” 19 Nov 1943, IRIS 

#00069620. . 

30Ibid. 

 

31Paper (U), Lt. Col. Clanton W. Williams, Acting Chief Historical 

Division, AC/AS, Intelligence, “Army Air Forces Historical Program,” 30 Dec 

1943, IRIS #00116419. 

 

32Paper (U), Lt Col Clanton W. Williams, “Army Air Forces Historical 

Program,” (Paper, American Historical Association, New York, New York, 30 

December 1943), IRIS #00122674. 

 

33Art (U), Marguerite K. Kennedy, “The Archives of the Historical Division, 

USAF,” in American Archivist, 17, no. 2 (April 1954), 126-27, available at 

http://archivists.metapress.com/content/42897783;13787744/ (7 Feb 2012). 

 

34Doc (U), “USAF Historical Archives 1942 – 1958,” 10, unaccessioned 

AFHRA material, “History of History.” For example, the Mood call number for 

documents originated by the 11th Fighter Wing is WG-FI-11, and those 

originated by the 66th Bombardment Squadron are assigned Mood call number 

SQ-BOMB-66. Other abbreviations may be added to the call number to 

differentiate between types of documents. For example, HI following a call 

number indicated that the document was a history, and SU designated a 

supporting document. Other abbreviations, such as PH for photographs, might 

be added to further describe individual documents. The Air Force Historical 

Research Agency and its predecessor organizations produced various iterations 

of a classification manual to guide accessioners in assigning Mood and decimal 

call numbers to documents added to the collection. 

 

35Doc (U), “USAF Historical Archives 1942 – 1958,” 10-11, unaccessioned 

AFHRA material, “History of History.” 

 

36Paper (U), “The AAF Historical Program,” ca. 1944, 4, IRIS #00122670. 

 

37Paper (U), Lt Col Clanton W. Williams, Acting Chief Historical Division, 

AC/AS, Intelligence, “Army Air Forces Historical Program,” 30 Dec 1943, 10-11, 

IRIS #00116419. 

 
32

38Paper (U), “History of the Archives, Historical Division, AU Library 1942 

through1949,” n. d., 10, 11, IRIS #01143907. 

 

39Fragment (U), “Report of Management Control on Historical Division,” 

14 Jan 1944, in AFSHO files, IRIS #00122673. 

 

40Paper (U), “History of the Archives, Historical Division, AU Library 1942 

through1949,” n. d., 11, IRIS #01143907. 

 

41Ibid., 12. 

 

42Memo (U), Colonel Clanton W. Williams, AAF Historian, to Chief, AAF 

Historical Office, “Final Report of the Retiring AAF Historian,” 1 Sep 1946, IRIS 

#00116424. 

 

43Paper (U), “History of the Archives, Historical Division, AU Library 1942 

through1949,” n. d., 15-16, IRIS #01143907. 

 

44Fragment (U), “Report of Historical Advisory Board (Drs. Guy Stanton 

Ford, Joseph R. Strayer, and John Allen Krout), to MG James P. Hodges, 

AC/AS, Intelligence, 16 Feb 1945, 3-5,” n. d., IRIS #00122673. 

 

45Fragment (U), “Longhand Draft of a History of the Historical Division by 

Col. C. W. Williams, 39-41, in AFSHO Files,” n. d., IRIS #00122673. 

 

46Bio (U), “Colonel Wilfred J. Paul,” n. d., IRIS #482028; Book (U), 

Richard H. Kohn, “Forward to the New Imprint,” to Plans and Early Operations, 

January 1939 to August 1942, Wesley Frank Craven and James Lea Cate, eds., 

vol. 1, The Army Air Forces in World War II (Washington: Office of Air Force 

History, 1983), ix. Col Paul subsequently served as Director of the Air 

University Library. 

 

47Paper (U), “History of the Archives, Historical Division, AU Library 1942 

through1949,” n. d., 20, IRIS #01143907. 

 

48Ibid. 

 

49Ibid. 

 

50Ibid. 
33

 

51Memo (U), Col W. J. Paul, Chief, Historical Division, “Objectives of AAF 

Historical Division,” 2 Jun 1945, IRIS #00122672. 

 

52Reg (U), AAF Regulation No. 10-8, “AAF Historical Office,” 23 Aug 1945. 

 

53Paper (U), “History of the Historical Division (July-Dec 1949), IRIS 

#00913622; Doc (U), “Employee’s Position Description,” 1 Nov 1946, IRIS 

#1155292. Administrative supervision of the Air Historian was provided by the 

Chief of the Air Historical Office, but the Air Historian was free to act 

independently in most matters. 

 

54Paper (U), “History of the Archives, Historical Division, AU Library 1942 

through1949,” n. d., 21, IRIS #01143907. 

 

55Ibid., 23. 

 

56Ibid. 

 

57Paper (U), Clanton W. Williams, “AF Historical Program,” ca. 1946, IRIS 

#00116423. 

 

58Art (U), Lloyd H. Cornett, Jr., “United States Air Force Historical 

Collection,” in Catherine D. Scott, ed., Aeronautics and Space Flight Collections. 

(New York: Hayworth Press, ca. 1985), 98. 

 

59Paper (U), Maj. Thad S. Strange, ACSC, “Development of the USAF 

Historical Program,” Mar 1951, 23, IRIS #009133623. 

 

60Paper (U), “History of the Archives, Historical Division, AU Library 1942 

through1949,” n. d., 26, IRIS #01143907. 

 

61Reg (U), Air Force Regulation 210-3, Historical Program and Procedures, 

14 Dec 1948. 

 

62Msg (U), Col W. J. Paul, Chief, Air Historical Office to AFCAG, and 

others, “Reestablishment of Air Historical Office Within Headquarters USAF,” 

15 Dec 1947, IRIS #00122672. 

 
34

63Msg (U), Col W. J. Paul, Chief, Air Historical Office to AFCAG, and 

others, “Reestablishment of Air Historical Office Within Headquarters USAF,” 

15 Dec 1947, IRIS #00122672; Draft AF Regulation No. 20-xx, “Establishment 

of the Air Historical Office Within Headquarters, USAF,” n. d., IRIS #00122672. 

 

64Paper (U), “History of the Historical Division (July-Dec 1949), IRIS 

#00913622. 

 

65Hist (U), Bea M. Estep, “History of USAF Historical Archives, July – 

December 1958,” 5-6, unaccessioned AFHRA material, “History of History.” 

 

66Paper (U), “History of the Historical Division (July-Dec 1949), IRIS 

#00913622. 

 

67The Air University Historical Liaison Office supported production of the 

multivolume work, Wesley Frank Craven and James Lea Cate, eds., The Army 

Air Forces in World War II, 7 vols. (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1953). 

 

68Paper (U), “History of the Historical Division (July-Dec 1949), IRIS 

#00913622. 

 

69Ibid. 

 

70Art (U), General Services Administration, National Archives and 

Records Service, “Federal Records of World War II, Volume II, Military Records, 

Part Two, The War Department and the Army,” (The National Archives, 

Washington, D.C.: 1951), 62, available at 

http://www.ibiblio.org/hyperwar/ATO/FRWW2-II/FRWW2-2.html (9 Nov 

2011). 

 

71Reg (U), Army Regulation 345-911/Air Force Regulation 181-5, 

“Records and Reports: Administration by Department of the Army of 

Noncurrent Records of Department of the Air Force,” 14 Jul 1950. 

 

72Book (U), General Services Administration, National Archives and 

Records Service, “Federal Records of World War II, Volume II, Military Records, 

Part Two, The War Department and the Army,” (The National Archives, 

Washington, D.C.: 1951), 152, available at 

http://www.ibiblio.org/hyperwar/ATO/FRWW2-II/FRWW2-2.html (9 Nov 

2011). 
35

 

73Reg (U), Air Force Regulation Change 210-3B, Historical Data Program 

and Procedure, 12 Dec 1950. 

 

74Ltr (U), Col John J. Donovan, AGD, Commanding, to Chief, 

Management Staff Division, AGO, 28 Mar 1950, IRIS #00913629. 

 

75Ltr (U), Lt Col F. A. Dunphy, Executive, Air Adjutant, to Commanding 

General, Air University, “Location of Records,” 12 Apr 1950, IRIS #00913629. 

 

76Ltr (U), Col L. L. Judge, USAF, Air Adjutant General, to Commanding 

General, Air University, Maxwell Air Force Base, Alabama, [Air Force Records], 

28 Sep 1950, IRIS #00913629. 

 

77Ibid. 

 

78Ibid. 

 

79Reg (U), Air Force Regulation Change 210-3B, Historical Data Program 

and Procedure, 12 Dec 1950.

 

80Bio (U), Maj Gen Richard A. Grussendorf, available at 

http://www.af.mil/information/bios/bio.asp?bioID=5644 (10 Nov 2011). 

Major General Grussendorf retired from active duty in July 1960 but was 

recalled in January 1969 to serve as Chief, Office of Air Force History, a 

position from which he retired on 16 July 1971. 

 

81Ltr (U), Col W. J. Paul, USAF, Director, to Col Richard A. Grussendorf, 

HQ, USAF, [Archives at Air University], 9 Oct 1950, IRIS #00913629. 

 

82Circular (U), HQ Army Air Forces, Assistant Chief of Air Staff, 

Intelligence, Historical Division, “Historical Officers Circular No. 2, 

“Instructions for Air Force Historical Officers of Staffs, Offices, and 

Commands,” 26 May 1943, in Administrative History Branch, Historical 

Division, AC/AS, Intelligence, “Manual of Instructions,” ca. 1943, IRIS 

#00116436. 

 

83Ibid. 

 
36

84Circular (U), HQ Army Air Forces, Assistant Chief of Air Staff, 

Intelligence, Historical Division, ”Historical Officers Circular No. 5, Form for 

Unit Histories,” 16 August 1943 in Administrative History Branch, Historical 

Division, AC/AS, Intelligence, “Manual of Instructions,” ca. 1943, IRIS 

#00116436. 

 

85Ltr (U), Col W. J. Paul, USAF, Director, to Col Richard A. Grussendorf, 

HQ, USAF, [Archives at Air University], 9 Oct 1950, IRIS #00913629. 

 

86Ltr (U), Col W. J. Paul, USAF, Director, to Col Richard A. Grussendorf, 

HQ, USAF, [Archives at Air University], 9 Oct 1950, IRIS #00913629. 

 

87Ibid. 

 

88Doc (U), Col W. J. Paul, Director Air University Library, to [AG?], 

“Correspondence re: ‘Location of Records,’” 5 Oct 1950, IRIS #00913629. 

 

89Doc (U), HQ, Air University to Air Adjutant General, HQ, USAF, 

“Location of Records, 12 Apr 50,” 24 Apr 1950, IRIS #00913629. 

 

90Book (U), General Services Administration, National Archives and 

Records Service, “Federal Records of World War II, Volume II, Military Records, 

Part Two, The War Department and the Army,” (The National Archives, 

Washington, D.C.: 1951), 154, available at 

http://www.ibiblio.org/hyperwar/ATO/FRWW2-II/FRWW2-2.html (9 Nov 

2011). 

 

91Hist (U), “History of Archives Branch USAF Historical Division, ASI, 1 

July 1966 – 30 June 1967,” 91, unaccessioned AFHRA material, “History of 

History.” 

 

92Reg (U), AFR (U), Air Force Regulation 210-3, Historical Data, 11 Mar 

1955. 

 

93Hist (U), Bea M. Estep, “History of the Archives Branch, USAF 

Historical Division, Research Studies Institute, 1 January – 30 June 1956,” 

Unaccessioned AFHRA material, “History of History;” Bea M. Estep, “History of 

the Archives Branch, USAF Historical Division, July-December 1961,” 11, 

unaccessioned AFHRA material, “History of History.” 

 
37

94According to the USAF Historical Archives Semiannual Report, January 

– June 1959, a footlocker held approximately two cubic feet of documents 

(unaccessioned AFHRA material, “History of History”). 

 

95Rpt (U), Marguerite K. Kennedy, Chief, Archives Branch, “Final Report 

of Disposition of Kansas City Records Center Material,” 26 July 1961, 

unaccessioned AFHRA material, “History of History.” 

 

96Hist (U), Bea M. Estep, “History of the Archives Branch, USAF 

Historical Division, July-December 1961,” 11-12, unaccessioned AFHRA 

material, “History of History.” 

 

97On 1 May 1951, AU General Order (GO) 20, dated 30 April 1951, 

combined the USAF Historical Division; the Arctic, Desert, Tropic Information 

Center; and the Documentary Research Section of the AU Library to form the 

3870th Special Activities Group. Effective 25 May 1951, AU GO 24, dated 22 

May 1951, redesignated the 3870th Special Activities Group the Research 

Studies Institute. On 15 January 1969, direction of the USAF Historical 

Program was transferred from Air University’s Historical Division to HQ USAF. 

At that time, the Office of Air Force History was established under the Office of 

the Chief of Staff, USAF, with Dr. Albert F. Simpson serving as Senior 

Historian. On 9 June, 1969, the USAF Historical Division was redesignated the 

Historical Research Center and assigned to Air University’s 3825th Support 

Group (Academic), which was redesignated the 3825 Academic Services Group 

(AU), effective 1 January 1973. The Historical Research Center was 

redesignated the Albert F. Simpson Historical Research Center (AFSHRC) on 15 

May 1972. When the Air Force inactivated the 3825th Academic Services 

Group on 1 July 1977, it reassigned the AFSHRC to the 3800th Air Base Wing. 

In 1978, the Air Force inactivated Air University as a separate command and 

assigned the AFSHRC to Air Training Command, headquartered at Randolph 

AFB, Texas. The Air Force constituted Headquarters, Albert F. Simpson 

Research Center, a direct reporting unit assigned to the USAF for activation, on 

25 May 1979. Effective 1 July 1979, the Air Force inactivated the Albert F. 

Simpson Historical Research Center, a named activity, and activated 

Headquarters, Albert F. Simpson Historical Research Center, a direct reporting 

unit assigned to the United States Air Force. On 1 December 1983, the Air 

Force redesignated Headquarters, Albert F. Simpson Historical Research 

Center as Headquarters, United States Air Force Historical Research Center. 

On 5 February 1991, the Historical Research Center’s status was changed from 

Direct Reporting Unit to Field Operating Agency, and on 1 September 1991, it 

was redesignated Headquarters, Air Force Historical Research Agency. 

 

98Hist (U), “Archives Branch History July – December 1964,” 80, 

unaccessioned AFHRA material, “History of History.” 
38

 

99Background Paper (U), “Background of Albert F. Simpson Historical 

Research Center Microfilm Project,” n. d., Folder 16A, “Background,” 

unaccessioned AFSHRC material. 

 

100Ltr w/1 Atch. (U), H. G. Geiger, Acting Chief, Documentation Systems 

Division, Directorate of Administration, DAF, to Archivist of the United States, 

“Proposed Policy and Specifications for Microfilming Historical Materials,” 18 

Sep 1970; Atch. 1, Paper (U), “USAF Historical Program Microfilm Project,” n. 

d., IRIS #01143906. 

 

101Ltr (U), James B. Rhoads, Archivist of the United States, to Herbert G. 

Geiger, Acting Chief, Documentation Systems Division, Directorate of 

Administration, DAF, [USAF Proposal Regarding Microfilming Historical 

Materials], 8 Oct 1970, IRIS #01143906. 

 

102Ibid. 

 

103Doc (U), “Draft for Letter from General Houston to DA on Microfilm to 

National Archives,” n. d., IRIS #01143906. 

 

104Ltr (U), Herbert G. Geiger, Chief, Documentation Systems Division, 

Directorate of Administration, to AF/CHO, “Disposition of Historical Program 

Records,” 3 Dec 1970, IRIS #01143906. 

 

105Form (U), Standard Form 115, “Request for Authority to Dispose of 

Records,” Department of the Air Force to Directorate of Administration, 

Document Systems Division,” 12 July 1971; IRIS #01143906; Report (U), 

“Appraisal Report: Disposal Job No. NN-172-5,” 6 Oct 1971, IRIS #01143906. 

 

106Reg (U), AFR 12-40, “Documentation Storage and Retrieval (DS&R) 

Systems,” 8 Mar 1971. 

 

107Federal Register (U), Title 41, Chapter 101, Part 101-11, “Records 

Management,” 44 Fed. Reg. 15718 (15 Mar 1979). 

 

108Ltr (U), Col. Van L. Crawford, Jr., USAF, Director of Administration to 

Archivist of the United States, “Returning Air Force Historical Program 

Microfilm to National Archives,” 3 Dec 1979, IRIS #01143906. 

 
39

109After Dr. Simpson’s death on 21 April 1971, the Air Force Historical 

Research Center was redesignated as the Albert F. Simpson Historical 

Research Center (AFSHRC) on 15 May 1972. On 1 December 1983, the 

AFSHRC was redesignated Headquarters, United States Air Force Historical 

Research Center. On 1 September 1991, the Center was redesignated 

Headquarters, Air Force Historical Research Agency (AFHRA). 

 

110Ltr (U), Col. Van L. Crawford, Jr., USAF, Director of Administration to 

Archivist of the United States, “Returning Air Force Historical Program 

Microfilm to national Archives,” 3 Dec 1979, IRIS #01143906. 

 

111Ltr (U), James E. O’Neill, Acting Archivist of the United States, to Col. 

Van L. Crawford, Jr., USAF, Director of Administration, HQ/USAF, [AFHRC 

Microfilm], 3 Dec 1979, IRIS #11043906. 

 

112Ibid. 

 

113Ibid. 

 

114Ltr (U), Maj Gen John W. Huston, USAF, Chief, Office of Air Force 

History to DAA (S), “Retirement of Microfilm Historical Material to National 

Archives and Records Service (NARS),” 28 Dec 1979, IRIS #11043906. 

 

115Notes (U), Thomas Rehome, [Microfilm Shipments], n.d.; E-mail (U), 

Thomas Rehome, AFHRA/ACD, to Mary Dixie Dysart, AFHRA/RS, “NARA 

Microfilm—Returned to AFHRA Storage,” 15 Jun 12. The Documents Shipping 

Log maintained by Sam Shearin showed that the last shipment accepted by 

NARA comprised HRA-03-018R through HRA-03-021R. It was shipped to 

NARA in 2003. AFHRA’s holdings include no original negative copy of 

microfilm roll #43000 or the preceding rolls in the 40,000 series but they do 

include original negative rolls numbered from #43001 forward, indicating that 

shipments to NARA ended with microfilm roll #43000. 

 

116The NARS, formerly under the General Services Administration, 

became an independent agency renamed the National Archives and Records 

Administration (NARA) and reporting to the President as a result of legislation 

signed by President Ronald Reagan on 19 October 1984, effective 1 April 1985. 

 
40

117Rule (U), AFRIMS, Series 84, Table 01, Rule 01.00, as of 29 Feb 2012; 

AFM (U), Air Force Manual 37-139, Records Disposition Schedule, 1 Mar 1996, 

Table 84-1, “Historical Program Records,” Rule 1. 

 

118Directive (U), Brig Gen Lawrence S. Kuter, Deputy Chief of the Air 

Staff, [Army Air Force Historical Program], 19 July 1942, quoted in Article (U), 

Lt. Col. Clanton W. Williams, Acting Chief, Historical Division, AC/AS, 

Intelligence, “Army Air Force Historical Program,” n. d., IRIS #116419. 

 

119Fragment (U), “Longhand Draft of a History of the Historical Division 

by Col. C. W. Williams, 39, in AFSHO Files,” n. d., IRIS #00122673. 
41

Appendix 

 

HQ Air Force Historical Research Agency 

and 

Its Antecedents 

 

On 19 July 1943, AAF Regulation 20-8 established the Historical 

Division in accordance with AG 210.31 and under the supervision and control 

of the Assistant Chief of Air Staff, Intelligence. 

On 23 August 1945, AAF Regulation 20-8 redesignated the Historical 

Division the AAF Historical Office and established it under, but not in, the 

office of the Secretary of the Air Staff. 

AAF Regulation No. 20-22, dated 13 August 1947, called for the 

reassignment of the Air Historical Office to Air University and its redesignation 

as an AU liaison office. 

Air Force Regulation 210-3, dated 14 December 1948, set out the 

objectives of the Air Force historical program and defined the organization and 

duties of the Air Historical Group, Air University, as being to “prepare the 

official history of the Army air component to 18 September 1947 and of the Air 

Force thereafter; and maintain an Air Force historical archives; coordinate and 

supervise all historical activity undertaken by Air Force organizations; and 

assist Air Force organizations to maintain professionally qualified historical 

agencies.” 

On 1 May 1951, AU General Order (GO) 20, dated 30 April 1951, 

combined the USAF Historical Division; the Arctic, Desert, Tropic Information 

Center; and the Documentary Research Section of the AU Library to form the 

3870th Special Activities Group. 

Effective 25 May 1951, AU GO 24, dated 22 May 1951, redesignated the 

3870th Special Activities Group the Research Studies Institute. 

On 15 January 1969, direction of the USAF Historical Program was 

transferred from Air University’s Historical Division to HQ USAF. At that time, 

the Office of Air Force History was established under the Office of the Chief of 

Staff, USAF, with Dr. Albert F. Simpson serving as Senior Historian. 
42

On 9 June, 1969, the USAF Historical Division was redesignated the 

Historical Research Center and assigned to Air University’s 3825th Support 

Group (Academic), which was redesignated the 3825 Academic Services Group 

(AU), effective 1 January 1973. 

The Historical Research Center was redesignated the Albert F. Simpson 

Historical Research Center (AFSHRC) on 15 May 1972. 

When the Air Force inactivated the 3825th Academic Services Group on 1 

July 1977, it reassigned the AFSHRC to the 3800th Air Base Wing. 

In 1978, the Air Force inactivated Air University as a separate command 

and assigned the AFSHRC to Air Training Command, headquartered at 

Randolph AFB, Texas. 

The Air Force constituted Headquarters, Albert F. Simpson Research 

Center, a direct reporting unit assigned to the USAF for activation, on 25 May 

1979. 

Effective 1 July 1979, the Air Force inactivated the Albert F. Simpson 

Historical Research Center, a named activity, and activated Headquarters, 

Albert F. Simpson Historical Research Center, a direct reporting unit assigned 

to the United States Air Force. 

On 1 December 1983, the Air Force redesignated Headquarters, Albert F. 

Simpson Historical Research Center as Headquarters, United States Air Force 

Historical Research Center. 

On 5 February 1991, the Air Force changed the Historical Research 

Center’s from Direct Reporting Unit to Field Operating Agency, and on 1 

September 1991, it was redesignated Headquarters, Air Force Historical 

Research Agency. 

 

 

 

 

 

(Back cover illustration) U.S. flag at the site of the former Tuskegee 

Army Airfield, Alabama. (USAF Photo/Samuel C. Shearin)