The facility was originally constructed in 1943 and had formerly served as an Army Air Corps Pilot School during WW2.

[1] The 725th Aircraft Control and Warning Squadron was assigned to Walnut Ridge AFS from Tinker AFB, OK on 1 July and began operating an AN/MPS-11 radar set at the station.

As a GCI station, the squadron's role was to guide interceptor aircraft toward unidentified intruders picked up on the unit's radar scopes.

During 1962 Walnut Ridge AFS joined the Semi Automatic Ground Environment (SAGE) system, feeding data to DC-07 at Truax Field, Wisconsin.

With its closure, Walnut Ridge was determined to be excess by the military and turned over to the local government for civil use.