Chapman Field Park is named for Victor E. Chapman, the first American pilot to give his life in World War I. He served in the Lafayette Escadrille, a French aero squadron of American volunteers who went to France to defend democracy before the United States officially joined the war, and the squadron was named for Revolutionary War hero Marquis de Lafayette. Chapman was killed in action over the battle of Verdun on June 24, 1916, and is buried within the Tomb of the Lafayette Escadrille outside Paris. After the United States entered the war in April 1917, the U.S. Army Air Service created Chapman Army Airfield in his memory. The land that is now Chapman Field Park was then the US Army’s Cutler Aerial Gunnery Field, and on November 15, 1918, it was formally renamed the Victor Chapman Military reservation and used as a pilot training airfield. The French Air Force still maintains an active-duty squadron named the Lafayette Escadrille in memory of the American flyers who served in World War I. After World War I, military activity at Chapman Field declined, and the U.S. Department of Agriculture leased parts of the airfield to cultivate tropical plants, including the first rubber and mango trees in the United States, while some areas were still used for winter aerial gunnery practice. World War II renewed military use of the field, and Women Air Service Pilots provided some Army and Navy flight and navigator training to male cadet pilots, trained first in Curtiss JN “Jenny” biplanes, and towed targets for anti-aircraft gunnery practice, a dangerous duty that wounded many pilots. Their commander and leading advocate was Florida aviator Jacqueline Cochran. After 30 years in obscurity, the WASPs received official veteran status in 1977, and in 2009 they received the Congressional Gold Medal, due in part to the work of United States Representative Ileana Ros-Lehtinen of Miami.