Naval Air Station Barbers Point Hawaii Patch

Naval Air Station Barbers Point was established on 15 April 1942 and disestablished in a ceremony on 1 July 1999, closing out 57 years of service on the southwest shore of Oahu. The station covered more than 3,800 acres, and the native Hawaiian name for the area is Kalaeloa. For most of its life it was home port for maritime surveillance and anti-submarine warfare squadrons. P-3 Orions of Patrol Wing Two flew from its runways out over the Pacific. For a generation of patrol squadron sailors, Barbers Point was the Navy in Hawaii.

Marine Corps Air Station Ewa, next door, closed and merged into Barbers Point on 18 June 1952 because Ewa had no room to grow for jet operations. When the station closed under BRAC in 1999, the P-3C Orion squadrons of Patrol Wing Two moved to Marine Corps Air Station Kaneohe Bay. Coast Guard Air Station Barbers Point stayed on after the Navy left, flying HC-130H Hercules and HH-65 Dolphin aircraft, and the airfield became Kalaeloa Airport.

The patch is an inverted triangle, point down, on a black field with a silver-gray border. A rainbow in orange, yellow, green and light blue arches across the top. Below it a white eagle with yellow beak and talons rises with wings spread, held up by two upraised pink arms and open hands. Silver ribbon banners curve up either side in blue letters, NAVAL AIR STATION on the left and BARBERS POINT on the right. The rainbow puts it squarely in the islands.

It measures 5.5 inches wide by 4 inches tall, a good size for the back of a vest or the center of a shadow box. The merrowed edge is a raised, rolled border that follows all three sides and keeps the points from fraying. An iron-on backing lets it go on at home with an iron and a pressing cloth. For a jacket that gets regular wear, a few stitches around the border will hold it for good. The eagle's feathers and the rainbow bands are stitched in separate colors, so the design holds up at a distance.

Barbers Point is a field that exists now only in cruise books, squadron photos and the memories of the people who worked its hangars and flight line. Frame this patch in a shadow box with your VP squadron patches, or wear it on the vest you take to a reunion. It also makes a gift for a parent who was stationed there, or a child who was born at Barbers Point and grew up hearing about it. It is a piece of Oahu that the Navy no longer flies from.