Opened in 1917, Ellington Field was one of thirty-two Air Service training camps established after the United States entry into World War I.

It is named for First Lieutenant Eric Ellington, a U.S. Army aviator who was killed in a plane crash in San Diego, California in 1913.

In its conduct of combat support sorties, the 147 ATKW provides theater and national-level leadership with critical real-time Intelligence, Surveillance, and Reconnaissance (ISR) and Air-to-Ground Munitions and strike capability.

The project consisted of ten buildings for the Army National Guard and reserve units, including a battle command training center complete with state-of-the-art computerized equipment.

The military ID center is expected to bring thousands of retired and active military annually to Greater Houston to renew or pick up IDs, Navy, Marine Corps and Army Reserve maintenance and storage facilities, a security checkpoint and the relocation of Coast Guard Sector Houston/Galveston from Galena Park to a new $20 million facility scheduled to be completed in 2013.

[6] The JRB is also the home base of a Civil Air Patrol composite squadron that routinely flies missions out of the Airport.

[7] Soon after construction began on the airfield, the base was named after Eric Ellington, an Army pilot killed four years earlier in a plane crash in San Diego.

By August 1918, Ellington Field recorded the most pilot fatalities of the 18 U.S. Army Air Service training bases in the United States.

[10] Ellington was considered surplus to requirements after World War I and the base was inactivated as an active duty airfield in January 1920.

A small caretaker unit was kept at the airfield for administrative reasons, but generally, the only flight activity during this time was from Army pilots stationed at Kelly Field who flew down to practice landings on Ellington's runways.

[7] In May 1923, the War Department had ordered the small caretaker force at Ellington Field to dismantle all remaining structures and to sell them as surplus.

Orders to abandon Ellington Field were abruptly halted, however, when the War Department authorized the Texas National Guard to establish an aviation squadron.

Hulen believed that the reactivation of Ellington Field as a reserve base would provide Houston an airfield and rekindle public interest in military aviation.

Mitchell spoke to enthusiastic crowds at Ellington Field confirming his belief that a strong Air Force was vital to national defense.

[7] Several years later in 1927, Ellington's status was again threatened as local city leaders began to discuss the construction of a municipal airport.

[7] The Texas National Guard and 36th Infantry Division bought most of the airfield's buildings, but the field remained unused; by 1928 Ellington was again overtaken by tall prairie grass.

That same year, a fire engulfed what was left of the airfield, consuming its remaining structures, except for the concrete foundations and a metal water tower.

[7] World War II, with its increasing need for trained pilots, helped to reestablish Ellington Field as an active facility.

[7] In 1940, construction began on a much-expanded Ellington Field, which eventually included five control towers, two 46,000-square-foot (4,300 m2) hangars, the most modern medical complex in south Texas and 74 barracks.

Bombardier cadets spent most of their time during the 10-week course in the classroom learning the skills necessary to accurately drop bombs on enemy targets.

"By taking over an Army job behind the lines, she frees a fighting man to join his fellow soldiers on the road to Victory," stated WAC director Colonel Oveta Culp Hobby.

[7] In 1948, Ellington Airport was one of many airfields selected to be reactivated in an effort to maintain a large military force in the United States after World War II.

[13] Ellington AFB was selected as one of the first of twenty-four Air Defense Command stations of the permanent United States surveillance radar network.

Assignments: In late 1972, the radar facilities at Ellington were reactivated by the now-renamed Aerospace Defense Command and given the new NORAD designation Z-240.

[7] Navy pilots and aircrews flew amphibious UF-1 Albatross and land-based P2V Neptune aircraft on antisubmarine and maritime patrol training missions over the Gulf of Mexico, but budget problems forced the closure of NAVAIRESCEN Ellington just a year later.

This program briefly continued at Ellington AFB after the base transitioned to Air Force Reserve claimancy, but was eventually shifted to other active duty USAF installations.

Eight years later, in 1967, the Civil Air Patrol relocated their national headquarters a final time to Maxwell AFB, Alabama, but a local CAP squadron still remains at Ellington.

[16] After Ellington's transfer to CONAC in 1958, Air Force Reserve (AFRES) activities played a larger role at the base.

With the retirement of 147th's F-16 aircraft, the 24/7/365 Continental NORAD Region (CONR) air defense alert mission for the western Gulf of Mexico and southern Texas border previously performed by the 147th needed to be replaced by another F-16 unit.

With this transition, the 147 RW was redesignated again as the 147th Attack Wing (147 ATKW) and remains operationally gained by Air Combat Command.