New Orleans Lakefront Airport

On February 10, 1934 more than 10,000 visitors from the United States, foreign countries and local New Orleanians attended the dedication of an airport that was to be "the Air Hub of the Americas".

New Orleans Lakefront Airport was built adjacent to the Industrial Canal, on a man-made arrowhead peninsula jutting into Lake Pontchartrain. To make land available for this elaborate project, the Orleans Levee Board drove a 10,000 foot retaining wall into Lake Pontchartrain and pumped in six million cubic yards of hydraulic fill to raise the field above the water.

Built at a cost of $4.5 million, the airport had a field measuring 3,000 feet long, thus qualifying for the U.S. Department of Commerce's highest rating, AA-I. Not only was the field considered the standard for the times but the art deco airport itself was considered a wonder of architecture and decor.