FORT HOOD: Fort Hood Celebrates 70th Anniversary

Lt. General Donald Campbell Jr. cut a cake in honor of Fort Hood's 70th birthday celebration as a crowd of Central Texas community members got a peak into the past about how the military instillation started.

FORT HOOD (September 18, 2012) --- On Tuesday commanders at Fort Hood and leaders from the surrounding Central Texas communities gathered on post at the III Corps Headquarters building to celebrate the 70th anniversary of Fort Hood.

Fort Hood Commander Lt. Gen. Donald Campbell Jr. recognized one distinguished guest in the crowd, 89-year-old Juanita Faucett.

Faucett's family farmed cotton and corn on land in the 1940s where Camp Hood was later built. Camp Hood later became Fort Hood.

Faucett and her family moved into Killeen in 1942 after the Army began acquiring land from several families like her own in the area. Faucett, her husband, and their newborn baby rented a room from family in Killeen.

Faucett said she attended the dedication ceremony for Camp Hood seventy years ago and never dreamed the instillation would become as large as it has.

"When they began taking the land, we just thought that we'd get the land back after Fort Hood or could buy it back or whatever," Faucett said. "Army life was so strange to all of us then. We had never been around the Army. It was absolutely foreign to us. It was something we knew nothing about."

Lt. Gen. Donald Campbell Jr. thanked the members of the surrounding communities for offering support for soldiers returning home and families of military members during deployments.

Currently Fort Hood supports more than 400,000 active-duty soldiers, retired military members, military family members, and members of the civilian workforce.

There are more than 46,000 soldiers at Fort Hood currently, this number is the highest its been in over a decade. About 2,500 troops from Fort Hood are currently deployed.