Gary W. Boyd is the Command Historian, Headquarters Air Education and Training Command, Joint Base San Antonio-Randolph, Texas. He provides guidance to the subordinate unit historians and heritage personnel throughout the command and manages the AETC museum program and Air Force art holdings on loan in the command.
Mr. Boyd has served at all levels of command as an Air Force Historian both on active duty and as a civilian for more than 25 years. He has also served as historian in many notable operations, including Operation Desert Storm where he was the A-10 wing historian for the 23/354 Tactical Fighter Wing (Provisional). He was the first Pacific Air Forces Command historian to take part in a joint exercise in the former Soviet Union. In September 1996 he deployed with an Eleventh Air Force team to Khabarovsk, Russia for SAREX 1996. In 2002 he served as the Air Force Centeral Command Forward historian in Southwest Asia. In 2003 he spent several months at Headquarters U.S. European Command, Stuttgart, Germany, compiling records of Operation Shining Express and Joint Task Force-Liberia. Then in 2008 he deployed again for Operation Enduring Freedom, where he compiled the history of intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance, and tanker activities in the Global War on Terrorism.
Prior to assuming his current position, Mr. Boyd was the Career Program Team Chief, History and Museums Program, at Headquarters Air Force Personnel Center at Randolph Air Force Base, Texas.
CAREER CHRONOLOGY
1. 1988 - Historian, Sheppard Technical Training Center, Sheppard AFB, Texas
2. 1991 - Historian, Operation Desert Storm, deployed to Southwest Asia
3. 1993 - Historian, 3rd Wing and 11th Air Force, Elmendorf AFB, Alaska
4. 1997 - Historian, 305th Air Mobility Wing, 21st AF and 87th Air Base Wing, McGuire AFB, N.J.
5. 2000 - Historian, 51st Fighter Wing and 7th Air Force, Osan Air Base, South Korea
6. 2001 - Historian, 305th AMW, 87th Air Base Wing, and 21st Expeditionary Mobility Task Force, Joint Base McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst, N.J.
7. 2010 - Career Program Chief, History and Museums Program, Headquarters Air Force Personnel Center, Randolph AFB, Texas
8. 2012 - Command Historian, Headquarters AETC, Joint Base San Antonio-Randolph, Texas
PUBLICATIONS
1990 Computer Based Instruction in the USAF, The Role of Sheppard Technical Training Center
1991 Sustaining the Wings, a Fifty-Year History of Sheppard AFB, Texas (co-author)
1992 Service to the Nation, a History of USAF Medical Training (co-author)
1995 "An Unwelcome Silence, the Loss of Yukla 27 (E-3B)," September 1995
1995 World War II in the Pacific, 1941-1945 (The Air Campaign for Iwo Jima)
1997 "No Foregone Conclusion," Arctic SAREX 96
2008 McGuire AFB (a history of the base)
2011 "Air Mobility, the Sine Qua Non of Airpower, Air Mobility in OIF, 2003-2007," Airmen at War
Articles
1992 "Alan Parmer, A Wichita Falls Hero with a Troubled Past," Wichita Falls Historical Quarterly
1996 "The V-143, 1930s Technology Transfer," Air Power History
AWARDS AND HONORS
ATC/AETC Excellence in Historical Program: 1989, 1990, 1992, 1993
ATC/AETC Excellence in Special Studies: 1991
PACAF Excellence in Historical Program: 1994, 1995, 1996, 1997
Air Moblity Command Outstanding Wing History: 2004, 2006, 2007
USAF Program Excellence: 1995, 1996, 2004, 2006, 2008
USAF Excellence in Historical Publications (An Unwelcome Silence): 1996
USAF F. Frank Futrell Award for Historical Narrative: 2011 (chapter on air mobility in OIF, 2003-2007, in Airmen at War
Civilian Exemplary Service Award, AFPC 2010-2012
(Current as of May 2013)