In the 1930s aviator Howard Hughes erected a tent at the airport to shelter his famous H-1 monoplane racer, which he tested from the dirt strip.

Scheduled airline service started in 1946 with Southwest Airways flying Douglas DC-3s on a multi-stop route between Los Angeles and San Francisco.

Southwest then changed its name to Pacific Air Lines which in turn began operating Martin 4-0-4 prop aircraft followed by Fairchild F-27 turboprops into the airport.

Also in 1968, Cable Commuter Airlines was operating de Havilland Canada DHC-6 Twin Otter service to LAX.

[9] Hughes Airwest ended all service to Oxnard in the early 1970s and was then replaced by Golden West Airlines and other commuter air carriers.

Golden West operated de Havilland Canada DHC-6 Twin Otter and Short 330 turboprops nonstop to Los Angeles (LAX), San Diego and Santa Barbara.

[11] Other service included Wings West with Beech 99 turboprops to Los Angeles and Desert Pacific Airlines flying Piper twin prop aircraft nonstop to San Francisco, Sacramento and Las Vegas.

[13] Also in 1980, Santa Barbara-based Apollo Airways was operating nine nonstop flights every weekday with Handley Page Jetstream commuter propjets from Santa Barbara (SBA) with direct connecting service from Bakersfield (BFL), Fresno (FAT), Las Vegas (LAS), Monterey (MRY), Oakland (OAK), Sacramento (SMF), San Francisco (SFO) and San Jose (SJC) via Santa Barbara.

[1] A single-engine Mooney M20C private plane crashed on July 10, 2022, into the airport fence along South Ventura Road during final approach while attempting to land.