Naval Support Activity Mid-South

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Naval Support Activity (NAVSUPPACT) Mid-South is located in Millington, TN, 21 miles north of downtown Memphis. NAVSUPPACT Mid-South is seven miles east of the Mississippi River. As the base has grown, so has its impact on the area. It plays an important part in the Memphis community and is one of the largest single businesses in the state of Tennessee.

The mission of the Naval Support Activity is to maintain and operate facilities, to provide administrative and logistic support to tenant activities and to perform such other functions and tasks assigned by higher authority.

As of October 1998 the population assigned was: 5,900 Active Duty Officer: 538 Active Duty Enlisted: 1533 Family Members (in housing): 1,484 Retirees: Over 50,000 Civilian Employees (appropriated fund, non-appropriated fund, and contract): 2,098 Reserve Component Officers: 196 Reserve Component Enlisted: 535.

BUPERS officially became the Navy Personnel Command on 01 October 1998. The Chief of Naval Personnel (CNP) is VADM Oliver, who still has his office in the Navy Annex and oversees our new Command as well as the N1 organization, which includes PERS 12 and PERS 13 (old PERS-2), which remained in the Navy Annex. The Navy Personnel Command includes all other PERS codes (PERS 3, 4, 6, 8, 9) formerly in Washington, D.C. Essentially, it was the same organization as previously except the policy arm of CNP (N1) has remained in D.C., and everyone else moved to Millington.

NSA Millington started to look more and more like a base versus a huge dirt parking lot. For those of you who have been here before, you won't recognize it. Many of the old buildings and fences are gone, new buildings are up, and the beautification efforts give it a park like setting; there are many wide open grassy areas for recreation. The support facilities are coming together and overall, NSA Millington is becoming a fine place to live and work.

This site was originally established in November 1917 as Park Field, an Army Signal Corps Aviation School used to train pilots for service with the Allied Forces during World War I. By February 1918, flight operations were in full swing, but only until November of that year when the Armistice was signed. Two days after the signing, training operations were ceased.

At that time the airfield began pioneering airmail routes throughout Tennessee and the surrounding states. In March 1920, the government officially purchased Park Field. However, the airfield continued to decline until it was little more than a storage area for aircraft and parts.

Ironically, the Stock Market Crash of 1929 breathed new life into Park Field. During the 1930s the field served as a transient camp for unemployed workers. In 1937 the Resettlement Administration took over the land and developed model farms used to demonstrate what could be achieved with correctly managed land. Park Field remained under this agency's jurisdiction until the outbreak of World War II.

Just as the onset of World War I had given Park Field its birth in 1917, the declaration of war on December 8, 1941, had similar results, heralding the arrival of naval aviation to the Memphis area. In February of 1942, the Navy Shore Station Development Board recommended approval of a reserve aviation base on the former site of Park Field. On September 15, 1942, the Naval Reserve Aviation Base (NRAB) was officially commissioned on the south side of the station. The primary mission of the base was to train aviation pilots to pilot proficiency for action in World War II. NRAB was first officially designated a Naval Air Station January 1, 1943, and encompassed what is now referred to as Northside (that area north of Millington-Arlington (Navy) Road), with its administrative buildings and runways. At the conclusion of World War II, the air station Northside was assigned to the Reserve Training Command and was utilized almost exclusively for reserve training until 1948.

The concept of the former Naval Air Station (NAS) Memphis was completely changed April 1, 1949. On this date, all support and logistics requirements of the activities aboard the naval reservation, including that area south of Navy Road, except the Naval Hospital, were assigned as responsibilities of the former Naval Air Station.

The 1993 Base Realignment and Closure Commission directed the realignment of Naval Air Station Memphis. NAS Memphis was redesignated Naval Support Activity Memphis September 30, 1995. The name was changed to Naval Support Activity Mid-South October 1, 1998, to more closely identify the base's mission requirements and to reflect the Navy's approach to regionalization.

NAVSUPPACT Mid-South, previously NAS Memphis, was officially established October 1, 1995, as NAVSUPPACT Memphis, a result of the 1993 Base Realignment and Closure Commission decision. On October 1, 1998, the name was changed to the present NAVSUPPACT Mid-South. The original 22-hundred acre base had grown to a 35-hundred acre complex, from a $203,000 parcel of land to a community of land, buildings, and equipment with a replacement value of over one billion dollars, and from a two-room operation in the Shelby County Courthouse to one of the largest inland installations in the world.

NAVSUPPACT Mid-South operates and functions with an allowance of approximately 1,100 enlisted and officer personnel, civilians, and full-time contract personnel, who provide all essential logistic and operational support services to the commands and activities on board. Considered by resident activities as the landlord of Navy Mid-South, NAVSUPPACT Mid-South performs the many tasks necessary for the proper functioning of a self-contained city, including housing, food service, utilities, and facilities for purchase of essential food staffs and personal items.

The primary tenant of NAVSUPPACT Mid-South is the Bureau of Naval Personnel, which relocated from Washington, DC. The command is now known as the Navy Personnel Command. Naval personnel matters were originally handled by the Secretary of War until the establishment of the Navy Department on 30 April 1798. It was not until 1815 that the Secretary of the Navy took control of personnel matters. In 1861, the Office of Detail was created and functions related to the detailing of officers and the appointment and instruction of volunteer officers, as well as the purchase of ships and related matters were transferred. The Bureau of Equipment and Recruiting was concurrently established to handle enlisted recruiting and service record maintenance. The Bureau of Navigation was established in 1862 and three years later the office of Detail was placed under it. In 1889, The Bureau of Equipment and Recruiting transferred its enlisted personnel activities to the Bureau of Navigation as well. On 13 May 1942, the command's name changed to the Bureau of Naval Personnel, and in 1982 it changed to Naval Military Personnel Command. In 1991, the name changed back to the Bureau of Naval Personnel or "BUPERS" for short. BUPERS is led by the Chief of Naval Personnel.

The base is home to Naval Support Activity and host to many tenant activities including Navy Band Memphis, Navy Personnel Command, Commander Naval Recruiting Command, Defense Automated Printing Service, DECA Memphis Defense Commissary, Branch Dental Clinic Memphis, Defense Investigative Service, Human Resources Office, Branch Medical Clinic Memphis, Navy Manpower Analysis Center, Navy Campus Millington, Naval Criminal Investigative Service Resident Agency, Navy Exchange Memphis, Naval Legal Service Office, Navy Personnel Research and Development Center, Naval Telecommunications Center Memphis, Personnel Support Detachment Memphis, Naval Reserve Readiness Command Region Nine, Naval Reserve Center, Resident Officer in Charge of Construction, US Army Corps of Engineers Finance Center(DFAS), US Army National Guard, US Army Veterinarian Service Millington, Federal Prison, US Post Office, American Red Cross, First South Credit Union, Flying Club, Navy and Marine Corps Relief Society, Millington Municipal Airport, and Millington Aviation Service.