Ventura Air Force Base

From The Bionic Wiki

Ventura Air Force Base is a United States Air Force airbase in California, likely located in Ventura County. Ojai is nearby.

[edit] School

A school is located on the base for the children of the men and women stationed there. Jaime Sommers officially taught 7th-9th grades there, although some of her students seemed obviously younger. As was typical of many schools of the era, she appeared to have her own particular classroom at the base.

Among the featured students of the school were: Andrew, John "Paco" Little Bear, Teddy, Gwen, Joey, Mark, Caroline, Jody Warner, Terry, Arty, Katie, and Pam.

[edit] Personnel

Aside from Jaime, the school also employed her fellow teacher, Karen Stone. Additionally, the base was known to be the primary duty station of Deputy Base Commander Lt. Col. Tom Hollaway, Maj. Don Mills, Sgt. Don Woods, Cpt. Anders, an unnamed communications officer, and an unnamed guard.

At various points, several officers were temporarily assigned to Ventura, including: Steve Austin, Jack Starkey, General Fuller and Captain Phillips.

A few people were shown to provide privately contracted or voluntary assistance to the school or base proper. They included Harry Anderson, Thomas Bearclaw, John Mallory, Briggs and Henderson.

[edit] Deconstructed

• While The Six Million Dollar Man preferred to use a variety of real-life airbases (such as Edwards, Luke, and Vandenberg), The Bionic Woman chose to establish this entirely fictional base. The ostensible reason for this was to avoid having to explain why Jaime would commute 5 hours a day between her home in Ojai to the school at Edwards. By creating a base called "Ventura", they were able to imply a much shorter drive.
• Canyon of Death implies that it, like Edwards, is a test flight facility.
• Although the school is nominally meant to support military families, the guardians of the kids were rarely seen. At lesat one known example exists in the form of Elora Mitchell. She, however, was John "Paco" Little Bear's aunt, and her appearance does little to establish Paco's entitlement to study at the school. (Canyon of Death)
• The precise grades Jaime teaches at the base are slightly controversial. Dialogue in Welcome Home, Jaime has her teaching 6th-8th grades, but The Bionic Woman title graphics indicate two different age ranges. The original titles for season 1 have her teaching grades 6-7, while the graphics for the second and third seasons have her teaching 7th-9th graders. Making the situation even more complicated is the fact that, in syndication, Welcome Home, Jaime was retitled as a Bionic Woman episode, using the later titles. Thus, syndicated viewers — and perhaps especially viewers whose memory stretches back to the initial syndicated run — have cause to be quite confused as to the grades she taught.