At one time during the [[World War 2]], Townsville (this area of Townsville used to be Thuringowa) was the [[USA]]'s largest overseas air base. It was common for [[B-26 Marauder]]s, [[B-17 Flying Fortress]]'s or [[B-25 Mitchell]] bombers to take off on long range bombing raids from [[Townsville International Airport|Garbutt air base]]. The first bombing raid on [[Rabaul]] on [[23 February]] [[1942]] was carried out by six B-17's based near Townsville.
Between the 2two world wars Thuringowa unwillingly gave most of it urban areas to Townsville and thsithis is how Townsvile got to where it is today back in 1818 Townsville was a very small area of land around Castle Hill but in 1882 Thuringowa had to give up more land and buy 1916 Thuringowa had lost almost all of it land in 1897 Thuringowa had 7612km2 and now it's 1872km2 the suburbs of Thuringowa all became Townsviile these suburbs are Alligator Creek,Woodstock,reid River, Majors creek, Hermit Park, Hyde Park, Pimlico, Mundingburra, Aitkenvale,Garbutt, Oonoonba, Stuart, Idalia, Cluden, Railway Estate and South Townsville, this is how Townsville got to be the size it is today.
