Goldwater Visitor Center

From USAFA Folklore

The Barry Goldwater Air Force Academy Visitor Center serves as the gateway to the academy, providing information on its history and cadet life to hundreds of thousands of visitors each year. The building is 31,600 square feet, and contains exhibits, a snack bar and a gift shop. A 1/3-mile nature walk connects the facility to the Cadet Chapel.

The center shows a short movie about the academy experience in its 250-seat theater, and an exhibit area features displays on Academy history and cadet life. A conference facility on the second floor features an executive conference room which seats 49 and state-of-the-art audiovisual equipment.

The center was built with donated and borrowed funds totaling $4.5 million. The private organizations which donated the building to the Air Force named it in honor of retired Arizona Senator Barry M. Goldwater, a WWII Army Air Force pilot who had achieved the rank of Major General and flew well over a hundred types of aircraft (including the P-40, P-47, A-26, F-100, F-104, F-16, B-47, B-1 and SR-71). Goldwater became a major proponent of building the United States Air Force Academy, eventually serving on the Academy's Board of Visitors (Goldwater was also the keynote speaker for the 1973 and 1983 graduations). The facility opened its doors in June 1986.