Welcome to the Museum
The Fort Gordon Historical Museum Society preserves the story of the U.S. Army Signal Corps and the Cyber Regiment it gave rise to — from the Signal Corps' earliest aviators to the women of the Hello Girls to the network warriors of today. This virtual museum brings that collection online, room by room.
Museum Map
Search for a room, or click anywhere on the floor plan to go there.
Every video in the museum's collection, organized by exhibit. Watch any of them there.
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Auditorium
Every video in the museum's collection, in one room. Pick an exhibit, then pick a video.
Welcome to the museum
Orientation videos from the museum's collection.
The Signal Story
Signal Regiment footage from the museum's collection.
The Cyber Story
Cyber Regiment footage from the museum's collection.
The Hello Girls
The documentary that brought their story back to light.
Fireside Chats
Six conversations from the museum's oral history collection.
The Signal Story
How a Civil War signal detail became the Army's nerve system — and how Fort Gordon became its home.
From flags to fiber
The U.S. Army Signal Corps was established on June 21, 1860, when Congress created the position of Signal Officer and Major Albert J. Myer began organizing a dedicated communications service for the Army. Myer's wig-wag flag signaling, developed in the years before the Civil War, gave field commanders something they had never reliably had: the ability to pass orders and observations across a battlefield faster than a rider could carry them.
Over the following century the Corps carried that mission through every generation of technology it touched — telegraph and heliograph in the Indian Wars, the Army's first military aircraft and radio experiments in the 1900s and 1910s, battlefield telephone and teletype in two World Wars, satellite and microwave systems in the Cold War, and today's data networks and cyber operations. Each generation of Signaleers built on the last.
Fort Gordon's own role in that story began after the Second World War. Camp Gordon, built in 1941 as a division training post, was nearly deactivated when the war ended — but in October and November 1948 the Army activated the Signal Corps Training Center there. The post was made permanent and renamed Fort Gordon in March 1956, and in June 1986 the Army established the U.S. Army Signal Corps Regiment with Fort Gordon as its regimental home. It has trained Signal Soldiers ever since.
Signal Guidons
The guidon — a small swallow-tailed flag — has marked Signal units on the march since the horse-cavalry era. Each color and device identifies a unit's branch and lineage at a glance.
Two regiments, one lineage
Today Fort Gordon is regimental home to both the Signal Corps and the Army's Cyber branch — sister disciplines built on the same founding idea: whoever controls the flow of information shapes the fight.
Est. 1860. Builds, operates, and defends the Army's communications networks — from tactical radio nets to strategic satellite links.
The Army's newest branch, headquartered alongside Signal at Fort Gordon's Cyber Center of Excellence — offense, defense, and information warfare in the network domain.
Signal Regiment footage is playing in the Auditorium.
The Cyber Story
The Army's youngest branch, built on the Signal Corps' oldest instinct.
A new branch, an old mission
Army Cyber Command stood up its operational headquarters activities and the Cyber Center of Excellence at Fort Gordon starting in 2013, consolidating the Army's cyber, electronic warfare, and information operations training alongside the Signal School. In September 2018, Cyber became the Army's newest basic branch — the first new branch created since Special Forces in 1987.
The crest above — a shield split in black and white beneath a raised dagger, bearing the words Defend, Attack, Exploit — belongs to the Cyber Center of Excellence, and captures the branch's mission in three words: defend Army networks, attack when ordered, and exploit the advantage that information gives a modern force.
Cyber Regiment footage is playing in the Auditorium.
Command Gallery
The full order of battle of the Signal Regiment — commands down to detachments — with each unit's activation date, drawn from the museum's own roster.
The Aviation Annex
Before there was an Air Force, its founders were Signal Corps officers. This wing traces military aviation back to its Signal Corps roots — and forward into the defense industry it built.
The Army's first heavier-than-air flying came out of the Signal Corps' aeronautical division — and these are some of the officers who flew it.
Foulois enlisted in 1898 and, by 1909, was one of the first three Army officers to fly the military's first airplane, purchased from the Wright brothers — accompanying Orville Wright on its final trial flight and setting speed, altitude, and duration records along the way. Posted alone to Fort Sam Houston, Texas, in 1910, he served for a stretch as the Army's only pilot, navigator, instructor, and commander of heavier-than-air aviation — teaching himself to fly by mail correspondence with the Wrights. In 1911 he built and flew the first radio receiver ever carried aloft in a U.S. Army aircraft. He organized and commanded the 1st Aero Squadron, led it into Mexico during the 1916 Punitive Expedition under Gen. John J. Pershing, and by 1931 became Chief of the Air Corps — the first military aviator to hold that post.
Kirtland transferred from the Infantry to the Signal Corps' Aviation Section in 1911 and took charge of the Army's aviation school at College Park, Maryland, where he recommended a young officer named Henry H. "Hap" Arnold for flight training — Arnold later became Chief of the Army Air Corps. Kirtland went on to command the 1st Aero Squadron, serve as an aviation inspector overseas in World War I, and retire in 1938 after 40 years of service — only to return to active duty at age 65. Albuquerque Army Air Base was renamed Kirtland Field in his honor in 1942, at Hap Arnold's personal request; it is known today as Kirtland Air Force Base.
Lahm was the first Signal Corps officer certified to fly balloons, dirigibles, and the Wright Flyer alike — and a rare survivor of a Wright Flyer crash. A mannequin honoring him stands today at the National Museum of the U.S. Air Force in Dayton, Ohio, beside a full-scale Wright Flyer replica, among a company of other early Signal Corps aviators.
Baldwin volunteered for military service again in 1917 at nearly 63 years old, was commissioned a captain in the Signal Corps' Aviation Section, and became Chief of Army Balloon Inspection and Production.
Grover Loening's fix
When Congress wouldn't fund new aircraft, the Signal Corps' chief engineer at North Island built his own.
As the Signal Corps' chief engineer at San Diego's North Island, Loening was frustrated by Congress's reluctance to fund new aircraft for a worn-out fleet. Rather than wait, he combined a Burgess-built trainer, a Curtiss airplane, and salvaged parts — possibly from a Martin trainer — into a single lighter, faster machine, building his own tail section and landing gear from scratch. He later helped shape a generation of aircraft designers, including Leroy Grumman and his co-founders, who worked under him before founding the company that became Northrop Grumman.
Airfields named for Signal Corps aviators
Several major U.S. installations still carry the names of Signal Corps pilots.
Named for Maj. Harold M. Clark of the U.S. Army Signal Corps, the first American to fly in Hawaii. Clark died on May 2, 1919, in a seaplane crash in Panama and is buried at Arlington National Cemetery.
Kirtland Air Force Base, New Mexico — named for Col. Roy C. Kirtland (profiled above). Today it is the third-largest base in Air Force Materiel Command.
The Signal Corps' aviators built the defense industry
A striking thread runs from the Signal Corps' pre-WWI aviation section into nearly every major American aircraft manufacturer.
Jack Northrop was drafted into the infantry in 1917, but the Army discovered he had been a draftsman for the Loughead brothers — later Lockheed — and released him early to design aircraft instead. He founded Northrop Corporation in 1939; it merged with Grumman in 1994. Grumman's own founder, Leroy Grumman, and his partners had worked for Grover Cleveland Loening, the Signal Corps' civilian chief engineer at San Diego, who had himself managed the Wright brothers' factory in Dayton.
Lawrence "Larry" Bell worked for Glenn L. Martin's aircraft company before being hired by fellow Signal Corps aviator Maj. Reuben Fleet at Consolidated Aircraft, which Fleet founded in Buffalo in 1923 and moved to San Diego in 1935. Bell later founded Bell Aircraft, builder of the Bell X-1 that broke the sound barrier with Chuck Yeager at the controls, and of the UH-1 Huey helicopter of Vietnam War fame.
Fleet's Consolidated built the PBY Catalina flying boat, which located the German battleship Bismarck in 1941, and the B-24 Liberator bomber. After merging with Vultee Aircraft, the company became Convair — builder of the six-engine, four-jet B-36 Peacemaker — before General Dynamics acquired it in 1953.
Glenn L. Martin's company was itself a training ground: Donald Douglas left to found Douglas Aircraft (builder of the DC-3 and the SBD Dive Bomber that sank four Japanese carriers at Midway); James McDonnell founded McDonnell Aircraft; and James "Dutch" Kindelberger founded North American Aviation, builder of the P-51 Mustang and the B-25 Mitchell flown in the Doolittle Raid. Douglas, McDonnell, and Boeing would all eventually merge into one company by 1997.
Elsewhere in the industry: Chance Vought's company built the F4U Corsair and the F-8 Crusader before a chain of mergers — LTV, Northrop Grumman, and finally Triumph Group. Bendix built the twin machine-gun turret for the B-17's nose before being absorbed into Allied Corporation and then Honeywell. And the light-aircraft makers Beechcraft, Cessna, and Lycoming — the last of which powered the Bell UH-1 Huey — are all part of Textron today.
It's an open question in the collection whether today's major defense contractors would exist in their current form at all, if the Signal Corps hadn't trained the aviators who went on to found them.
The Hello Girls
223 women. One war. A story nearly lost.
In 1918, the U.S. Army Signal Corps sent 223 women to France as telephone operators to help win the First World War. Fluent in French and English and trained on the Army's own switchboards, they connected the calls that moved orders along the front — some working within range of artillery fire. Told through letters, photographs, rare archival footage, and interviews with family and historians, their story remained almost entirely unknown for a century.
S.815 — Hello Girls Congressional Gold Medal Act
A bill to award the Congressional Gold Medal, collectively, to the female telephone operators of the Army Signal Corps known as the "Hello Girls," in recognition of their service during the First World War.
The film that brought their story back to light is playing in the Auditorium.
Fireside Chats
First-person recollections from the Signaleers who lived this history.
Six conversations from the museum's oral history collection are playing in the Auditorium.
Signal Corps History Interview
A conversation with U.S. Army Signal School leadership, recorded for the museum's oral history collection.
Donor Spotlight
The Campaign Circle recognizes the giving that keeps this museum open.
Campaign Circle
Named for Revolutionary War engagements, in ascending order of scale — the museum's permanent donor recognition ladder.
Featured donor: Peter Kind
Recognized at the Charleston level of the Campaign Circle. The museum's Heritage newsletter has featured his support alongside fellow Campaign Circle donors Robert Gilbert and Frank Whitehead.
Honor Roll
The people behind the museum — staff, board, advisors, distinguished members, and the Hall of Fame.
Museum Staff
This room is framed and ready for staff photos and bios — add names, titles, and portraits here.
Board of Directors
This room is framed and ready for board member photos and bios.
Council of Advisors
This room is framed and ready for advisor photos and bios.
Distinguished Members
This room is framed and ready for distinguished member photos and citations.
Hall of Fame
This room is framed and ready for Hall of Fame inductee photos and citations.
How to Get Involved
Six ways to help keep this history open to the public.
Current sponsorship opportunities
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at gordonhistoricalmuseum.org and follow the museum's ongoing work.
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Time Waits for No One
The museum's own progress, three snapshots in.
This strip is ready for a fourth stop whenever the museum reaches its next milestone.