Joint Expeditionary Base–Little Creek (JEB–LC), formerly known as Naval Amphibious Base Little Creek and commonly called simply Little Creek, is the major operating base for the Amphibious Forces in the United States Navy's Atlantic Fleet. The base comprises four locations in three states, including almost 12,000 acres (4,900 ha) of real estate. Its Little Creek location in Virginia Beach, Virginia, totals 2,120 acres (860 ha) of land. Outlying facilities include 350 acres (140 ha) located just north of Training Support Center Hampton Roads in Virginia Beach and 21 acres (8.5 ha) known as Radio Island at Morehead City, North Carolina, used for U.S. Coast Guard ships and personnel as well as serves as an amphibious embarkation/debarkation area for U.S. Marine Corps units at Marine Corps Base Camp Lejeune, North Carolina. It is also home to the Naval School of Music. The mission of the Naval Amphibious Base is to provide required support services to over 15,000 personnel of the 27 homeported ships and 78 resident and/or supported activities. The base's combination of operational, support, and training facilities are geared predominantly to amphibious operations, making the base unique among bases of the United States and Allied Navies. The Naval Amphibious Base Little Creek is the largest base of its kind in the world. On October 1, 2009, Little Creek and the U.S. Army's Fort Story finished a two-year merge into one joint base, officially named Joint Expeditionary Base Little Creek–Fort Story. History World War II On July 16, 1942, a U.S. Navy truck drove off Shore Drive, the scenic highway along the south shore of the Chesapeake Bay between the resort areas of Ocean View in Norfolk and Virginia Beach in Princess Anne County. The resort town was located on the shore of the Atlantic Ocean several miles south of Cape Henry, at the entrance to the bay. Near an inlet called "Little Creek" the truck stopped in a waterlogged bean field of the Whitehurst family's farm. For days thereafter, trucks loaded with lumber and equipment rolled into the area in almost continuous succession. The reason for this mass assault in a bean field northeast of Norfolk was that, early in World War II, Navy planners saw a necessity for landing large numbers of American troops on foreign shores in the face of enemy gunfire. That such operations would be difficult was also evident. New methods and techniques in landing troops