Dustin White
Editor

Mandan has had a long history with aeronautics. 83 years ago, on June 2, 1931, the area saw it’s first airmail service. Operating from a temporary landing field two miles west of Mandan, a Northwest Airways monoplane took off with 324 pounds of mail.

Two short years later, on May 2, 1933, Mandan would formally dedicate their first municipal airport. Construction on Ben Eielson Airport would continue until July of the same month.

The airport was named after Carl Ben Eielson, a Hatton native. Accompanied by Hubert Wilkins, Eielson became the first to travel across the North Pole by air.

After a year of operation, Ben Eielson Airport, which was located south of the east end of “the Strip” in Mandan, had made sufficient improvements to be designated as a commercial airport by the U.S. Department of Commerce.



During the first five years of operation, the airport was managed by Johnny “Upside Down” Osterhouse. Osterhouse came by his unique nickname by having flown upside down under the Veterans Memorial Bridge in Mandan. Later on, in 1934, he would earn the title of the first North Dakotan to race in the Indianapolis 500.

Throughout the years, Ben Eielson Airport would be the place in which many pilots would learn to fly, especially in the years leading up to WWII.

Today, Mandan boasts one of the largest general aviation airports in the state. In the last few years, the airport has been seeing additional use. With the oil boom in the west, more planes are taking advantage of runways in our city, as they fly back and forth from western North Dakota.