Black Sheep Squadron's filming location: the "South Pacific" airstrip has since been ploughed into an empty field
Where was Black Sheep Squadron filmed? Baa Baa Black Sheep's "South Pacific" base was Indian Dunes Airport in Valencia, California — an airstrip that has since been ploughed into an empty field.
Every generation gets the war show it deserves, and the late '70s got Baa Baa Black Sheep (later Black Sheep Squadron): Robert Conrad as Marine ace Pappy Boyington, a squadron of gorgeous screwups, actual flying Corsairs, and a "South Pacific" that was — let's check the map — thirty-ish miles north of Hollywood.
Vella La Cava, California
The squadron's island base was shot at Indian Dunes Airport in Valencia, a dirt strip on a 600-acre movie ranch owned by the Newhall Land & Farming Company, conveniently located near Six Flags Magic Mountain. The runway was built in the 1960s for the company's own planes and leased out to Hollywood, which is how the same patch of Santa Clarita dirt also hosted The A-Team, The Fall Guy, The Incredible Hulk and, as its final TV tenant, China Beach.
The illusion-maintenance details are my favorite part:
- The open-ocean flying scenes used the Channel Islands off Southern California as a stand-in Pacific
- Some dogfights were recycled clips from 1969's Battle of Britain — German markings visible if you squint
- Sharp-eyed viewers have long clocked the high-tension power lines in the background, a utility not widely available on Vella Lavella in 1943
What the real Black Sheep thought
The actual Pappy Boyington — Medal of Honor recipient, 28 kills, professional handful — served as the show's technical adviser, appeared on it, cashed the checks, and still described it, with total serenity, as:
The man contained multitudes. Asked at a 1981 Smithsonian event, standing in front of a restored Corsair, whether he could still fly one, he replied:
And now?
The strip is gone. Not "decommissioned and preserved" gone — gone gone. The airfield was abandoned, plowed over, and is now an empty field, a fact flight-sim nerds periodically rediscover via aerial photos with the exact tone of someone visiting a childhood home that's been turned into a parking lot. Where Corsairs once thundered past confused motorists on Highway 126, there is dirt. Farewell, fake Solomon Islands. You were beautiful, you were load-bearing, and you had power lines.