George Bush Intercontinental Airport in Houston, Texas, was previously called Houston Intercontinental Airport from 1969 until 1997.
It was renamed in honor of George H W Bush, the 41st President of the United States from 1989 to 1993 and also a member of the US House of Representatives representing Texas’s 7th congressional district. He and his wife, Barbara, settled in the community of West Oaks, Houston, after leaving the White House in 1993 at the end of his presidential term.
To mark the change of name, Bush departed the airport on a ceremonial flight om April 30th, 1997, with his wife, former Secretary of State James Baker, astronaut John Young, and Houston Mayor Bob Lanier, and landed back some 50 minutes later to the airport having been renamed in his honor. A bronze statue of Bush by Texas sculptor David Adickes, called ‘Winds of Change’, stands in the airport’s terminal C.
