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Before sunrise one Saturday morning in the early 1970s, Derryl Garner cracked the door of his son’s bedroom, light from the hall spilling across the small figure in bed. Gently

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Before sunrise one Saturday morning in the early 1970s, Derryl Garner cracked the door of his son’s bedroom, light from the hall spilling across the small figure in bed. Gently

The Jets Next Door

F-16 Fighting Falcon at Air Station Cherry Point

Before sunrise one Saturday morning in the early 1970s, Derryl Garner cracked the door of his son’s bedroom, light from the hall spilling across the small figure in bed. Gently nudging the boy, Garner whispered, “Wake up. You’re going to work with me today.” His son, Kyle, rubbed the sleep from his eyes and swung his feet to the floor.

“I thought, What in the world is going on?” Kyle Garner remembers now. “I never got to go to my dad’s office because of the security.” But on this morning, as Kyle got dressed, Garner told him, “Son, you’re going to see something today that will be life-changing.”

The two climbed into Garner’s car and drove through downtown Newport. Kitchen lights from a few homes with early risers punctuated the darkness. The pair rode north for a few miles, through Croatan National Forest, until the longleaf pines and open road abruptly gave way to the sprawl that marked Havelock’s city limits. Father and son passed through the gates of Marine Corps Air Station Cherry Point and into the quiet base, stopping near the flight tower.

Derryl Garner

Derryl Garner Photography courtesy of Kyle Garner

The two climbed to the top, where Garner lifted his son onto his shoulders and pointed out into the distance. The sky was changing from black to blue, the stars growing faint. Suddenly, a roar filled Kyle’s ears. The air in the tower vibrated. A silver bullet raced across the horizon, dropping in elevation as it approached the tower. The roar grew louder, its pitch climbing. The Harrier jet hovered, then entered a slow, near-vertical descent, finally coming to rest on the tarmac.

“Because of my dad, I got to see one of the very first Harrier jets, if not the first, fly into North Carolina,” Kyle says now. That morning, he witnessed history being made.

The arrival of the Harrier jet, and its ability to achieve a nearly vertical takeoff that did not require a conventional runway, was the beginning of a new era in our nation’s air defense. It also marked a new chapter in Cherry Point’s history, just as the commissioning of the base in 1942 had marked a new chapter in the history of eastern North Carolina.

• • •

Although it’s a different town, in a different county, Newport’s relationship with Cherry Point is as continuous as the stretch of blacktop between the self-proclaimed “Town with Old-Fashioned Courtesy” and the military gates announcing, “Pardon our noise, it’s the sound of freedom.” The bond between the two is as strong as it was in 1941, when, on the eve of the attack on Pearl Harbor, crews began clearing swamps, cutting trees, and digging ditches to build an airstrip on a Neuse River promontory called Cherry Point.

“When the base started over there in the ’40s, Havelock as we know it didn’t exist,” says Linda Pollock, a lifelong resident of the area and volunteer and historian at the Newport Historical Museum. Until Havelock was established in 1959, Newport was the nearest proper town to the base and offered all the modern amenities of the era, like a soda shop, bank, and movie house.

“The people from Newport went over there to work,” Pollock says. “Basically, it’s been that way ever since. My daddy worked at Cherry Point for 30 years. My husband worked there for 32 years. Many people in the area depend on the base to make a living.”

Likewise, Kyle remembers, “In the neighborhood that I grew up in, more than half of the people on our block worked at Cherry Point.”

Pardon Our Noise, It's the Sound of Freedom entrance sign at Marine Corps Air Station Cherry Point

For more than 80 years, the roar of jet aircraft has filled the skies over eastern North Carolina towns like Havelock and Newport. A sign outside Marine Corps Air Station Cherry Point calls it the “sound of freedom.” Many local civilians also think of it as the sound of opportunity. photograph by Baxter Miller

The opportunities that MCASCP opened, the jobs that it created, and the economic impact of operating a military base transformed a primarily agricultural region into a lynchpin in the nation’s defense system. New, secure jobs now offered civilians stable pay and good federal benefits.

Derryl understood the importance of Cherry Point — not only from a regional perspective but from a personal one as well. Born into a tobacco farming family, he found that the base offered a different, more prosperous future. “In this area, there were very few options to progress in your life. Education in this part of eastern, rural North Carolina was limited,” Kyle says. “When they created the base, it provided those opportunities. Cherry Point gave my dad an opportunity to expand his horizons.”

Growing up in the shadow of the base that opened when he was 10 years old, Garner took an interest in aeronautics. “My father was extremely good at math and was very artistic as well. He could draw and draft, but he started out as a tool cleaner,” Kyle says. “Through the process of the apprentice program, it taught him skills that he could apply and do something with. And that’s what he did.”

• • •

Derryl Garner spent his entire career at Cherry Point, retiring after 42 years of civilian service. His dedication to the base was matched only by his love of Newport, a town whose fate was intertwined with the base. “I think that next to my mother,” Kyle says, “that probably his greatest love was the town and people of Newport.” Garner would ultimately devote his life to serving not only his country but also his community.

“Someone approached him when I was a child about running for town commissioner. My dad went to his boss at Cherry Point and said, ‘Well, what do you think?’ He looked at my dad and said, ‘Hell, Derryl, run for mayor instead. Be the top dog.’” In 1977, Garner won his first mayoral election, and he’d win every other election for the next 36 years. During his tenure, the town made countless improvements, including building the first town hall, the first public library, a town park, and a new police station.

After retiring from Cherry Point in 1992, Garner turned his full attention to his town. The timing was serendipitous. The U.S. Department of Defense had recently established a commission to explore the restructuring and possible closure of various bases. Cherry Point was on the chopping block — but not if Garner could help it. Along with a coalition that included Gov. Jim Hunt and other state and federal elected officials, Garner fought to keep and grow Cherry Point.

“My father took that very seriously because he knew what the impact of Cherry Point was.”

“My father took that very seriously because, being a native of the area, he knew what the impact of Cherry Point was,” Kyle says. “It was a pretty big honor to stand beside the governor of your state to try to promote and keep people’s jobs.”

Garner’s successor, Mayor Dennis Barber, notes, “In many ways, we were and are a military community. People who work and serve at Cherry Point want to live here in Newport, and when they retire, they want to stay here. Mayor Garner always advocated for how important the base was for our town.”

The roar of military aircraft above the town of Newport is a reminder of that connection. The establishment of Cherry Point changed the fabric of the little farming and fishing community, and today, it continues to shape the town, breathing new life into the small business district.

Mayor Derryl Garner died in 2017, leaving a legacy of small-town values and a commitment to people and country. As Kyle looks around at the revitalization taking place in the town that Garner loved so much, he knows his dad would be proud. — Ryan Stancil


Marine Corps Air Station Cherry Point

Over the years, aerial photographs of Marine Corps Air Station Cherry Point have been taken to preserve a visual record of the growth and development
of the base.
Photography courtesy of U.S. Marine Corps photo by Lance Cpl. Lauralle Walker DVIDS, The appearance of U.S. Department of Defense (DoD) visual information does not imply or constitute DoD endorsement.

On Base

Click here to read more about the history of Cherry Point.


Newport Historical Museum in Havelock

Special events and programming happen throughout the year at Newport Historical Museum; follow their social media pages for the latest updates.  photograph by Baxter Miller

In Action

Click here to read more about attractions that celebrate and support veterans in Newport and Havelock.

 

This story was published on Oct 29, 2024

Ryan Stancil

Stancil is a writer and photographer based in New Bern.