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York for burial. The training field and the thirty-four buildings and hangars were razed in the 1920s.
A memorial for Vernon Castle was erected in 1966 at the crash site near the corner of Vernon Castle

Avenue and Cozby West Street. The memorial included a replica of a Curtis Jenny and photographs
of Castle and the airfield. As his eagle scout project, Jerret Martin, a Benbrook scout, restored the
monument in 1997. The monument was rededicated as part of the City's fiftieth anniversary; the
ceremony was attended by dignitaries from Canada, Great Britain, and the United States.

The only remaining building is an ammunition warehouse west of Highway 377 (Benbrook
Boulevard); the foundations of several buildings can be found behind some of the homes along
Cozby North Street. The City contacted the National Archives, the Defense Department, and the

Texas State Library to find original plans for the airfield, but to no avail. Following the closure of
Benbrook Field, the land was purchased by William Monnig and used as a dairy. The dairy was later
acquired by Manning Trammell and then later by Mrs. Grace Cozby.

GROWTH OF BENBROOK

1920s and 1930s

Benbrook's population was estimated to be thirty-three people in both 1920 and 1930. The
community's business base consisted of two stores. Other nearby communities in the 1930s
included Chapin (twenty-five voters), Wheatland (population of forty and a school), and Primrose.

By 1935 the population had increased to one hundred sixty-one. Many imposing homes were built

in the area in the 1930s by such people as Elliot Roosevelt (son of President F. D. Roosevelt). Mr.
Roosevelt's home was in the area of what is now the east side of Benbrook Lake. Roosevelt's Dutch
Branch Ranch covered approximately 1,300 acres in the Benbrook area. The ranch was purchased
in 1935 by Elliot's wife, Ruth Goggins Roosevelt, and served as their home while Elliot was president
of the Texas State Network. President Roosevelt visited his son at his ranch on four occasions from
1936 to 1944. The Roosevelts sold the ranch in 1944; Fort Worth oilman, Sid W. Richardson,
purchased the ranch in 1946. Much of the ranch was condemned by the U. S. Government for
construction of Benbrook Lake in 1947.

1940s

Ed Sproles, head of the Texas Motor Truck Transport Company, constructed the Sproles House to
serve as the center of his large cattle ranch. Most of the house and outbuildings remain; most of
the land was submerged by Benbrook Lake in 1947. In contrast to the opulent homes built during
the 1930s, a "Hooverville" shanty town was located in Benbrook in 1933 during the Great
Depression.

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