The US Air Force was officially founded on 18 September 1947, and in the decades since it has established itself as an air force second-to-none. Yet the Air Force’s history and heritage goes back the turn of the twentieth century.

Between 1909 — when that the US military purchased its first aircraft — and 1947, the US Air Force did not exist as a separate and independent military service organization. It went through a series of designations: Aeronautical Section, Signal Corps (1909); Aviation Section, Signal Corps (1914); United States Army Air Service (1918); United States Army Air Corps (1926), and United States Army Air Forces (1941).