State Military Reservation

The State Rifle Range, built here in 1912, was the first permanent training facility for the Virginia Volunteers, later the Virginia National Guard. During World War I, the post was leased to the U.S. Navy for warship crew training. Virginia’s first state-owned airfield opened here in the 1920s, and the post was renamed the State Military Reservation (SMR) in 1928. During World War II, the U.S. Army leased the SMR, named it Camp Pendleton, and conducted a building campaign that accommodated the training and housing of thousands of troops. The post reverted to Virginia after the war. The Camp Pendleton/SMR Historic District reflects the Virginia National Guard’s evolution over more than a century.