Came across this website. Grew up in Smyrna. My dad was in aircraft maintenance in the 314th from 1955 to 1963. From 1978 to 1981 I worked for commercial airlines on what is now called Smyrna Airport.
The area where the base hospital was located is today taken up by a large vehicle maintenance facility for the TN Army National Guard. The hospital buildings were some of the first to go after the base closed. Most buildings were moved from the base rather than being torn down. Example is the Catholic Church. it was moved to Smyrna by First Baptist Church and is in use today by the church that purchased the facility when FBC moved to a new building. The lake you asked about is Percy Priest and the river that feeds it is Stones River. The creek that runs through the base area is Stewart's Creek and it dumps into Percy Priest behind the big hangar. Soon after the lake came about a base beach was built just behind the big hangar and was named for a former base commander.
On another post some one said that several hangars have been torn down. The hangar behind hangar 693 burnt down when it was used to build houseboats not long after the base closed. One of the wooden hangars from WWII on the flight line may have been torn down and one of the metal hangars on the flight line that is occupied by the TN Army Air Guard had an extensive fire. I don't know if the hangar was torn down or repaired. The big hangar has been used since the base closed by numerous commercial airline maintenance companies. The first to occupy the big hangar after the closure was Capitol Airlines operating DC8 aircraft worldwide.
